Les Nuages de la Perdition
by CN
Summary: "But currently, you are a cloud, and your views of me are such. It is my job to remove those views, and together we shall see something far more beautiful…" Bijou's life, if you could call it that, was over before she knew it. StanBijou HamtaroBijou
1. Part I: Senescence Suspended

**CN**

**Les Nuages de la Perdition**

**Part I: **_Senescence Suspended_

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I have NO idea what inspired me to write this, and especially for _this_ fandom. You see I write for other categories as well, but for some really, really gory reason, I chose to write this story for this one.

And I have absolutely no clue as to what tortured muse came to me and whispered to me to make this fic. The idea came to me about four days ago, and I tried pushing the thought from my mind every time I thought about it. I know I mess with the characters' of "Hamtaro" personalities a lot, but this was far too dark and OOC for my liking. I refused, originally. I couldn't; I _wouldn't_.

But yet, here I am for God knows what reason typing this. It's like my twisted little CN brain won't give me peace until I publish this ridiculous story. My only hope is that you guys will forgive me for what I do to these characters.

**WARNING:** This isn't a light-hearted fic. It's probably one of my darkest to date, if not _the_ darkest. It's why I upped the rating for this one. Please don't hate me after you read this.

And just so you know, this was in no way inspired by "Twilight", "True Blood", "The Vampire Diaries" or any other vampire media out there. This is just a twisted plot that came into my mind one cloudy day less than a week ago, and the end product is this.

To add one final note, this story is complete, as in I've finished writing and editing it in its entirety. It has three parts, and you are about to read the first one. I'll upload the second part in a few days, and the third part a few days after that.

_I'm so sorry._

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Though love repine, and reason chafe,  
There came a voice without reply,—  
'Tis man's perdition to be safe, When for the truth, he ought to die…'

_**-**__Ralph Waldo Emerson_

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It smelled like the most fragile part of the library, where the oldest and most valuable books were kept on display. Even with her face covered, there was no denying this scent. Yes…Indeed, the lingering sensation of ancient dust was omnipresent, causing a dry sensation in her mouth and a few small coughs to leave her deprived throat. The tangible humidity, of wherever she was, also left a heavy, metallic taste on her tongue. She was left with no option but to bite her tongue, refusing to let her mouth's muscle taste anymore and all the while forbidding her from opening her mouth and letting the arid dust in.

Perhaps the reason she was so concerned with her taste and smell was because her vision, her hearing, her _touch_ had been taken from her.

She was on her knees, kneecaps pressed against some soft sort of carpet, and her hands were tied behind her back. She was not only blindfolded, but a fabric bag of some sort had also been placed over her head.

How long had she been here? Just yesterday—it _was_ yesterday, right?—she had been perfectly fine, living her life with her friends, her family, her…

_Breathe_, she told herself. How had this happened? _Think, think carefully…!_

She had been walking to her car, yes, that's right! She was walking out of building where she worked to her car. And then, out of nowhere, her world went black.

_So I've been kidnapped in broad daylight?_ She thought, lost in melancholy, with her head hanging lower as a new wave of depression took over.

She had just woken up but a few minutes earlier, quickly realizing the visual, audio and tactile restraints that had been put on her, and that escape was made nearly impossible. Not only were her hands tied behind her back, they also seemed to be connected to something else. She couldn't move away at all, and she bitterly admitted she wouldn't get very far as long as her hands remained tied behind her back, unable to remove the covering on her head.

She desperately wished they had gagged her mouth, so she didn't hear herself sob.

Then, it happened. Almost immediately after the first whimper left her mouth, she felt someone's hands on her head, their cold digits slowly removing the bag from her head.

For a few seconds, Bijou relished the feeling of "fresh" air on her pale face, and her Ham-Human ears wiggled, desperately moving to zero in on a sound. Then, even knowing she couldn't see anything and still knew nothing about her whereabouts, an ear-piercing cry filled the room:

"HELP ME!! PLEASE—CAN ANYBODY HEAR ME?! HELP ME!!!" Out of habit, her voice was in Japanese. She gasped for breath, all-too-ready to start her shrill cries again when she felt a hand play with the blindfold's tie at the back of her head.

As the strip of fabric fell down and rested at the base of her neck, Bijou came face-to-face with a pair of lime-green eyes, with a stare so blank and devoid of empathy that Bijou was reminded of a rotting log, for whatever reason.

"Oh my," the girl with strawberry-blond hair said as she stared at Bijou's face, "Just to inform you, screaming will not do you any good, though it is quite troublesome," she explained. Bijou's mouth was on the verge of lashing out, when the girl—with inhuman speed—had the fabric now wrapped around Bijou's mouth.

Wait…they were speaking in French…Not Japanese…

This girl, Bijou realized, was part of her captors and was no one to lean on for any sort of assistance. Her eyes lowered indignantly as the girl stood up, once again looking emptily at the bound girl at her feet.

"She's mad…in fact, she's furious!" a new voice cried out, ecstatic at Bijou's emotion. Bijou quickly shifted her head to see him, her emerald eyes widening and her mouth falling open under the fabric.

The woman Bijou had just been staring at…her twin, her identical was leaning against the wall. Or at least he _had_ been leaning there, until he made his little outburst and started walking over to Bijou, his hands clapping slowly as he laughed to himself.

It was then that Bijou finally realized the outfits the two of them were wearing. The man was dressed like he had walked out of an 1800s castle, as had the girl, wearing a lacy, dark green ball gown with a corset top. And from what Bijou could tell as she kept her infuriated eyes on the approaching male, she realized the décor of this room was from the Old World as well.

"You're incredible," he said as he kneeled down on one knee to Bijou's level. He placed one of his hands, freezing cold and causing Bijou to gasp out loud, against her chin and forced her to look straight into his lime eyes.

"Isn't she absolutely everything I described, Sandy?" he asked as he tilted his head to the side. It was almost like he was amused by the girl's suffering.

"She may be to you, Stanley. To me she is little more than another human," the girl replied, her eyes closed as she leaned against the wall her twin had just occupied.

Bijou's glare intensified. If only her look could kill, he'd long been six-feet under.

But the man—Stanley—just kept staring amusedly at her. Was this psycho kidnapper truly enjoying her pain?!

"Your fury…well, I haven't felt something that passionate in years, decades, even!" he looked back to his sister, wanting to show her his excitement. Sandy, however, merely shrugged. She folded her hands over her chest and looked to the side.

Decades? But he didn't look any older than Bijou, who was still in her early twenty's.

"You, _you_," he whispered, getting closer to the girl, until his mouth was barely hovering over hers, "You feel such amazing things. Such happiness, and fear, and despair, even when you're unconscious, did you know that? It's beautiful and absolutely captivating!"

And just as Bijou feared that the lunatic would kiss her, he pulled himself back, much to her relief, though he moved his hands to the side of her neck. Bijou straightened her posture as she shivered at his iceberg-touch. A sense of angered curiosity splashed into her. What was with his obsession with feelings, anyway, and why was he so cold?!

Stanley laughed to himself yet again. "You're curious about my excitement, I can tell," he said as if reading her mind. "I can do that, you see. I sense emotions, though no human's emotions have ever called out to me like yours have. Nor has any heartbeat ever resounded in my head so dramatically as when I first saw you and felt your pulse from yards away," he explained, his fingers flitting over her jugular.

Bijou's breathing became controlled as she resisted crying at his freezing body. She _would not_ let him see her be weak, that much she had decided.

She bit her lip as he absent-mindedly continued to stroke her neck. Alright, so this mental-ward fugitive apparently believed he could sense emotions and heart beats. Good for him. But (Bijou winced as his entire hand moved down her neck and to the neckline of her shirt), why was his skin so pale and his body temperature colder than a block of dry ice?

"Such rich, pure, innocent blood," Stanley said as he eyes her clavicle lecherously. Instinctively, he brought her neck as far as he could, given the restraints on her hands, to his mouth, his tongue barely gliding over the skin of her neck before he immediately pulled away.

And had she not seen it happen with her own two eyes, she would've believed it were a trick of light or her hunger-deprived brain. But there, as he brought their eyes together and she watched his smile widen, she saw _them_ come out. Sharp, pointed, radiantly white daggers pierce out of his gum and forming the perfect knife.

_Oh…God…_

Visually, Bijou saw the girl say something, but her heart was now racing with adrenaline, demanding a release from this place, for she would surely be killed. Its beating dwarfed any other sound in the room, save for her own whimpers as she realized what she was dealing with was the supernatural.

"Now, you must promise you will not scream again. No one that can save you will come, and it will only tire your throat," she heard the girl slither in her ear. When did she get behind her?

All Bijou could do was nod. The truth was, she couldn't scream even if she tried. Her throat was choking with a mixture of tears and vomit, and against these monsters, she knew there'd be no winning.

"She's currently too afraid to move, Sandy. And I can feel her hopelessness surrounding her thoughts as well," Stanley continued, leaning one of his hands as his eyes continued to take in her every feature.

"…W..why me?" Bijou asked as her mouth restraint fell to the floor, her voice constrained and miserable and coarse, speaking in a childish tone in French. She couldn't even look up at his face anymore as she just hung her head lower and lower. At this question, Stan beamed.

"Ahh, French sounds so beautiful coming from you! It's a wonder I found you all the way in Asia. Imagine that, Sandy," Stanley cried excitedly.

"I think she'd prefer if you answered her question, Stan," Sandy reminded as she rested her cheek against Bijou's white locks, relishing in the human's sweet, decadent aroma of blood.

Stan glared at his sister, almost as if reminding her that this girl was _his_. Sandy merely yawned at her brother's jealousy, letting go of Bijou but slicing, with her hand, the ropes binding Bijou's hands together and to the table behind her.

Bijou immediately pulled her sore hands to her chest, still refusing to look at either of the two vampires (as she was sure that could be the only thing they were) as she massaged her gnawed wrists.

"I've sensed so many humans and their emotions in my many years," Bijou refused to look, even though his voice was sad, "but no emotions have ever struck out to me like yours have. It's the most refreshing, intoxicating sensation I can remember having, just by trying to enter your mind!"

Suddenly, his hands were once again on Bijou's chin as he forced her to look up, lime meeting emerald and exhilaration meeting total dejection.

"But currently, you are a cloud, and your views of me are such. It is my job to remove those views, and together we shall see something far more beautiful…"

"Good night, my dear Bijou." Bijou glared as the monster said her name. How did he know it—by searching her belongings? "Sandy, see to it that she has food when she wakes. She's still human and cannot be sustained on blood alone."

With that said, Stan stood up, as did his sister, both heading towards the door on the far side of the room.

"I suggest you get some sleep tomorrow, as you will be needing it. Til tomorrow night, _Cherie_!" he called over his shoulder.

With a sound click, the door locked behind the two, leaving Bijou to grab a fistful of her hair as she buried her face down, deep into the fibers of the rug beneath her.

She hadn't ever cried so much in her life as she did in that one night, lying in the growing sunrise and letting the red rays fall over her, drowning her in a pool of beautiful blood.

That was the first time she prayed for her death.

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Her face was no longer pale. It was red and lifeless with how much rubbing she did to get the burn of her tears to stop. They felt so hot compared to the bone-chilling sheet that his every touch had left on her skin that she had no choice but to scrub them away.

By some miracle, she had found her way to the bed in the room, and she sat there, back pressed against the ornate headboard, as she stared out at nothing.

The room itself was quite nice. It was made of massive, gray granite blocks, leading her to believe she was in some sort of castle. There were stained-glass windows behind her bed and to her left, with a dark, four-poster bed surrounding her. The bed was draped with salmon-pink bedding as well as drapes that formed the canopy of the same color, the same shade of pink the rugs and the tapestries hanging on the walls were. Along the room there was various furniture—an armoire, a vanity, a globe, and two night tables—that were the same color of stained wood as her bed. From what she could tell, there was an adjacent bathroom to her right.

For an hour, Bijou thought she must've dreamt her life in the twenty-first century. She was positive that her mp3 player, her car, her computer at work, that was all an incredibly elaborate figment of her imagination, for why on earth would such creatures live so oddly in the modern world?

But then she remembered all too quickly that they could not control time. They could create a universe where these two were some twisted rulers, living in a time that no longer existed, but these monsters could not themselves touch the essence of time.

With red, puffy eyes, the girl looked out the window and saw a cloudy sky. She was bright enough to figure that they were in same part of France, or at least far, far away from Japan. She was trying to figure out which part, though, going by the large evergreens that scraped at the window and the many green fields she saw. Had she the energy, she would've gone to the window and investigated further.

A clicking sound caused Bijou to look up, astonished as the door opened and two young maids, dressed in relatively modern black and white maid outfits, entered the room. One had a tray with juice and fruit on it, and the other carried a garment in her hands.

"Good morning, Miss Haruna," the one holding the food said as she placed the tray into Bijou's lap.

"Master Stanley asked for you to change into this dress before he visits you tonight," the other maid chimed in, laying out a beautiful silk, sky-blue gown.

Bijou turned her head to the side.

"Not my name," she said in a dry voice, choosing instead to look at the gray she could see through the stained glass.

The two maids exchanged a quick glance, nodding that from what their master told them, her name was indeed Bijou Haruna.

"…err, forgive me, mademoiselle, but isn't your name Bijou Haruna?" the maid with the food asked nervously. They were to be the girl's ladies-in-waiting, and so Stan had given them very specific orders to tend to her every need, and the most basic of those orders was to learn her name.

"It's _Madame_ Haruna. I'm married," she spat, turning an icy glare to the two maids.

The two maids instantly realized the severity of her words. They didn't necessarily feel any more sympathy for her than they did for themselves. Should Stanley ever find out, or worse, should they have to tell him, or possibly the worst option of them all, should they choose to not tell him and he find out…well, either way, it was a horrible predicament for these two.

"Does Master Stanley know?" the maid with the dress asked, hoping that he did and that they wouldn't have to spill the beans.

Bijou's jaw locked, "I have no idea."

Both maids visibly gulped. The two of them had no idea how to proceed from here, as they were also under strict orders to tell Stan of anything the girl attempted to do or told them that could possibly hurt her or him in anyway.

"I-if that's all, Miss Ha-haaa-Bijou, we'll be on our way," one of them piped up. Bijou couldn't tell which one as she idly picked up a diced piece of cantaloupe that was on her plate.

"Are you human?"

The maids turned around in sync to see the girl whose eyes were normally much wider and full of life stare at them with eyes almost as hollow as Mistress Sandy.

"Yes," said the maid who brought in the food. "We are both human." She had a soft smile on her face, as if she were almost proud of this fact.

"Then why would you ever choose to work for…_them_?" her voice became rough again as she thought about her two captors. She tossed aside the small piece of fruit. She had no appetite, anyway.

Wincing at Bijou's refusal to eat, the other maid decided to explain, "Our families have been servants to Master Stanley and his sister for generations. They provide us with a good place to live, wonderful food, and basically the best of everything, while asking for very little from us in return."

"They're very kind people," added the other young girl.

"But they're not people," Bijou choked out again. "You're just condoning kidnapping the longer I stay here!"

At this, the maids' eyes softened. She didn't know their masters like they did. Given time, she would accept them wholeheartedly.

"Please eat your breakfast. Lunch will be served soon, and you shall have dinner with Master Stanley," said one of the maids.

"Also be dressed before your lunch arrives." The maid eyed the beautiful gown lying on Bijou's bed.

As they left and locked the door behind them, she tossed away the tray of food left in her lap, causing clangs on the hard floor as the dishes and glassware broke. Bijou pressed her head further into the pillow and let out yet another choked cry.

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Her lunch met the same fate as her breakfast. If she could open the windows, she would've thrown the food to the birds.

She didn't know why she was starving herself, perhaps she was hoping the lack of nutrition would eventually kill her. However, the thought of _him_ kept her wishing to be alive and well, if only to return to him very, very soon. With this in mind, she had taken a few sips of the beverage that was served with her lunch before she threw the rest of the food onto the floor.

For whatever reason, she had actually decided to change her clothes into the gown given to her after taking a bath in the adjacent bathroom. It was most likely because her other clothes were starting to smell a little dingy after wearing them for two days straight, not to mention they were dirty and a little ripped, most likely a result of her abduction.

So she stood by the stained-glass window, staring out at the sky that was turning more and more light blue as the minutes passed. It would eventually turn black as the night settled in.

Did he sleep during the day, she wondered as she realized it was well past sunset. He said he would see her tonight, and at this, another sinking feeling set into her. And apparently they would _dine_ together, something that made Bijou's appetite sink farther and farther away.

"My, my, this is troublesome," a voice said from behind Bijou, his breath playing with the skin on her neck. Bijou immediately spun around, pressing herself against the window as she peered back at Stan's green eyes. When did he get into the room?!

"You haven't touched your food at all, have you?" the man said amusedly as he stared at the broken glassware on the floor. His hands remained tucked behind his back as he turned his eyes back to her.

"Now, that won't do at all."

Bijou's eyes remained stern as she placed her arm across her chest, her hand resting over her heart in an attempt to calm its thrashing beating.

"You look lovely, however," he admitted as his gaze went over the well-fitting dress that clung to her upper body like a glove.

"Shall we?" he offered, extending her his elbow. Instead of taking his arm, however, Bijou pressed her heels further against the wall, actually wanting the window to break and for her to fall to her death. _That_ seemed so much more appealing than going anywhere with him.

"Ahh, disgust," Stan laughed as he scratched the bridge of his nose idly. "You have yet to feel a positive emotion in my presence."

"Is that a surprise?" Bijou snapped defensively, immediately putting a hand over her mouth. She was hoping to stay quiet and refuse to give into any of his provocation, yet she had completely failed at that task in less than two minutes!

Stan's grin grew wider. "So you do speak. And here I thought I'd have to coax your tongue out of your mouth," he whispered, his hands reaching up and touching the corners of her chin. Bijou jerked her head back as far as she could, noticing that he had gloves on tonight so his touch wasn't so harsh, though still shiver-inducing.

"Now come," he said, this time an order as he held out his elbow yet again. When Bijou continued looking at him with hatred, Stan's grin turned into a tight-lipped smile.

"I was planning on taking you to the dining room, but we can stay here if you prefer to do something more…intimate," as he finished, his eyes pointed to the direction of the bed.

Bijou let out a cough, her gag complex activated.

"And there's that disgust again," he laughed. "But the choice is up to you, _Cherie_," he reminded, this time holding out his gloved hand to her.

"I will _never_ get into bed with you, Monster," she hissed, one hand holding her neck and the other hand slapping down into his outstretched one, deciding to dine with him rather than the alternative he suggested.

Stan's smile continued to grow wider as his fingers wrapped around hers, more and more chills going down Bijou's entire body.

"Is that so? Your emotions tell me you're quite determined, which is a nice change from the disgust, but that only makes the challenge more fun for me," he explained as they started moving out of the room and, thankfully, away from the bed.

The disgust just returned for Bijou, but this time it was dwarfed by fury.

"Fury," Stan said to himself as the door to Bijou's chambers closed behind them. He didn't look back at her once as he led her down the stone halls.

Bijou had been skeptical about his claims to be able to read emotions since all her emotions were visibly present on her face, but slowly she started to believe that maybe he _could_ read her emotions. It wasn't an incredibly useful gift, she thought to herself. She could not imagine herself feeling any sort of positive feelings for him ever, something he'd be reminded of every timed he tapped into her mind.

"What do you plan on doing with me?" she asked, trying to pry her hand away from his icy death grip. Unfortunately, he was inhumanly strong and all efforts to get away proved to be useless.

"Curiosity." _Must_ he repeat her every emotion to her whenever he spoke? "Well your blood has the most tantalizing scent I've ever felt," he explained as he peered over his shoulder to look at her.

"Then drink my blood and kill me," it surprised Bijou how easily and almost demandingly she said this.

Stan stopped and turned around, releasing her hand which she pulled back to herself.

"Your blood is far too unique to be wasted on a meal." Bijou didn't know whether to feel relieved or fearful that she wouldn't be dying anytime soon.

"Your beauty, your voice…everything about you points to my ideal mate," he finished, tucking his hands behind him.

In that instant, Bijou's world seemed to grow to only her and Stanley, surrounded by a circular wall of stone.

"M-m-mate?" Bijou put a hand over her mouth and stepped back, much to the monster's thrill.

Stan did nothing but stare at the girl, his stoic expression never changing.

"So you want me to become…like you…?!" Bijou stepped back further, a sweat breaking out on her face, and Stan wondered if she would try to run away, not that she would make it more than a few feet before he'd stop her.

"I don't plan on turning you until you fully decide to commit yourself to me, but I must warn you: I'm _not_ a patient man," he said as he took a step closer to her.

"Never!" Bijou cried. "I refuse to let any part of me have anything in common with you!" the white-haired girl stepped back further.

"That fear and determination you currently harbor will eventually fade. Sooner or later, you will yield to me," Stan said calmly as he stepped closer and closer to her.

"No, I won't," Bijou replied almost maddeningly as she shook her left hand in his face. "See this ring?" she pointed to her ring finger and the gold band, encrusted with diamonds, that adorned that finger.

Stan neither looked surprised nor taken aback as she shook her hand at him.

"This, this thing right here symbolizes my husband! You might have brought me here to live with you, Monster, but my husband is still very much alive and with him in my heart I will never, ever be yours!" she spat.

Here, Stan's eyes lowered. All the identification he had found of hers in the purse didn't indicate that she was married. Of course she was a beautiful young woman in her prime. It made sense that she was happily married. However, the fact that she was someone else's did not rest easily with him, for she was _his_ and his alone.

"What a pity, then," Stan said as he grabbed her left arm, startling Bijou and causing her to hold her breath. He used his free arm to slide the ring off her finger, despite Bijou's cries of protest.

"Stop! What're you doing!"

"…that you shall never see your precious husband again." With tears in her eyes, Bijou watched the monster use his strength to pluck the diamond off the gold like a grape off its vine. He crumpled the gold band like a piece of paper, and then threw it so far behind Bijou that the girl got whiplash turning to see the band land somewhere in the darkness of the corridor.

She turned around to face Stan again when she felt a vibration in the ground.

Bijou whimpered as she saw what used to be her ring's diamond crushed under Stan's boot, the pressure of his stomp leaving cracks in the stone floor.

The girl put both her hands over her mouth to restrain her cries as she moved backwards, shaking her head.

"It…it doesn't matter!" she said as free tears fell from her eyes. "I told you, he lives in my heart, so until the day you rip that out of me, I'll still never be yours!"

"Human memories fade very quickly, something you'll realize when I turn you. When I do turn you, you'll soon forget you were even married. _That's a promise._ Now, shall we go to dinner in peace, or shall I turn you right now? Really, both are suitable outcomes for me," he said nonchalantly.

He outstretched his hand to her once again, knowing very well which option the girl would choose.

"I'll never forget, no matter what you do to me," she hissed, hesitantly putting her hand into his.

"Of course you won't," Stan said patronizingly.

The second her hand was in his, they flashed away.

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The dining room was nothing but more stone walls and giant ceilings, draped with more fancy tapestries that belonged in a museum rather than present-day.

There was also a table nearly thirty-feet long with only two seats at it, one on either end of the rectangular piece of wood.

Stan and Bijou appeared in the dining area with a jolt, and Bijou, barely having eaten in the past two days, nearly collapsed forward with the sudden rush of blood to her head. Stan caught her before she fell on her face, only needing one hand on her stomach to support her.

Without any effort, Stan moved one of the chairs back, setting his precious prisoner into it and positioning her to sit straight up, despite her nauseous appearance.

"Moving at that speed wouldn't have been so bad if you ate your meals like you were supposed to," Stan reminded, watching the girl sink slightly. He leaned forward and gave a rough kiss into her hair before he pushed her chair in, forcing her chest to be compressed against the table.

"Don't do that to me…ever…again," Bijou finished groggily as she looked across the table a few seconds later, as Stan was already seated. She put a hand to her temples to reduce their throbbing.

"Eventually you'll be used to it. And once you yourself become a vampire, you'll master it all on your own," a comment that made Bijou look to her side in disgust.

"Surely there were millions of other girls for your liking," Bijou said in a voice that she could barely hear herself. Stan, however, picked up her words perfectly despite the distance between them.

"Perhaps, but in all my decades, you're the only girl that's ever had such as astounding appeal to me," he mentioned greedily, enjoying the disoriented blush on her face.

"So tell me, _Cherie_, how long had you been with your husband?" he asked as he leaned forward.

"Three wonderful, amazing," she turned her head to look at him, "_passionate_ years."

If this was her attempt at infuriating him, it was working. However, he refused to let her see that as he leaned back in his chair.

As Bijou continued staring him down, the maid arrived and put a barely-cooked steak in front of her. Its plate was soaked with its own blood. Bijou grimaced.

"You're still mad about the ring?" Stan asked, causing another furious glare from Bijou as she looked up from her plate. Of course she was mad, and it's not like she had any plans of showing Monster any sort of forgiveness. The incident had only happened a few minutes earlier!

"The ring was a symbol, but the symbol isn't necessary when you have what it represents wherever you go," she retorted.

"Ahh, but a girl named Bijou should have a far more splendid jewel to call her own than the one your unfortunate husband gave you," he said, smiling dryly. Unable to look at his smug face any longer, Bijou returned her attention to the plate.

"I'm not eating this. It's barely done and there's blood everywhere."

Before she could blink, Stan was sitting on the table, right beside her plate. Bijou stiffened as he, fangs out, picked up a soup spoon and with one, swift swipe, managed to pick up all of the blood "sauce" on the plate and place it into his mouth, his throat relishing the feeling of the warm substance going down and filling his body with a refreshing strength.

"Better?" he asked as he dragged the spoon out of his mouth.

Bijou glared, though they both knew she was currently mortified.

"I still…I still refuse to eat that steak. I can't drink blood like you can," Bijou reminded as her eyes lowered.

"We can remedy that problem right now," Stan said as his mouth immediately moved to her neck. Bijou shook ever-so-slightly, petrified as his mane of strawberry-blond hair tickled her face.

But Stan pulled away just as his fangs scraped her neck, much to Bijou's relief.

To her surprise, Stan picked up the steak with his gloved hands, not caring about the blood soaking out from it and staining their flawless white fabric.

Instantly, he dug his fangs into it, biting deep and hard as his eyes wandered to Bijou's. Her eyes watched in astonishment at how easily he sucked the meat dry, reducing it to nothing more than a slab of nutritionless muscle.

He threw that bloodless steak down onto the plate and looked at her expectantly.

"You bit it, you eat it," she said childishly, turning her head to the other side once again.

Bijou gasped as his hands were under her chin again, painfully squeezing her cheeks and forcing her to look at him.

Once his eyes caught hers, he looked down to the steak, always smiling. He used his right hand to hold her face in place while crossing his left arm underneath and cutting a piece of steak for his beloved.

"I warned you to not test my patience, didn't I?" he said as he held up a fork with a small piece of steak on it with his left hand. He brought the fork to this mouth, but when Bijou forced her lips shut, Stan applied a little more pressure to her jaws.

"_Ahh_!" Bijou cried, afraid that if the grip on her face got any tighter, her jaw would become unhinged. Her lips parted and let him put the steak into her mouth, drawing a meatless fork out a few seconds later.

"Now chew," Stan ordered. When Bijou refused and let the meat stay in her mouth, Stan smiled so widely that his fangs were the only things Bijou could see.

Did they get longer?

"I've had my fill of your shenanigans. If you don't eat, I will turn you this very instant," he threatened.

With tears of physical pain in her eyes, Bijou reluctantly chewed the meat. Pleased, Stan put another piece of meat to her mouth, which Bijou was forced to chew and swallow, as well as the next one, and the next one, and the one after that, and all the bites that followed.

A good half-hour later, there was no food left on her plate and Bijou hurriedly swallowed the last piece of meat.

"Now if I hear that you're skipping your meals again, I will personally come to you without warning and force you to eat, or, of course…" he stroked her carotid artery, "you know the alternative."

"I hate you," Bijou spat. Never had she ever spoken those words with such malice and detestation before.

And what's worse, that bastard did nothing but _smile_.

**-**

**-**

Moments later, Bijou was returned to her bedroom as Stan opened the door for her.

Bijou walked in, expecting to hear the door close. However, what she _felt_ were his hands on her shoulders.

Bijou spun around defensively, but before she could register what was going on, she felt two ice cold lips upon hers, crushing her. Bijou immediately pulled back, feeling a sharp stinging on her bottom lip.

As she touched her lip, she realized Monster had bitten her. Indeed, he stood just inches away, relishing the taste of her blood on one of his fangs.

"It's incredible," he laughed to himself, his tongue continuously scraping over his fang. "Absolutely wonderful!"

As his eyes settled on her frightened form, he could feel his desire for her rising.

"You look stunning in the moonlight," he told her, indicating the soft blue light that fell into the otherwise pitch-black room.

Bijou shook in fear as he turned around, much to her surprise, giving a slight bow to his princess, before he made his way out of the room.

Bijou grabbed one of the pillars of the bed for support, clutching it with all the strength she had left as she cried, almost doubled-over in agony.

She dreamed of killing herself that night.

**-**

**-**

In the morning, a new maid delivered Bijou's breakfast.

"Please be sure to finish it all," she said, smiling brightly at the dismal Bijou.

"Where're the maids that came yesterday?" Bijou asked, ripping off a small piece of toast and forcing it to go down her throat.

"Master Stanley does not approve of those who do not inform him of everything he needs to know," the maid said simply.

For a moment, Bijou was left doe-eyed and confused until…

"_I'm married." "Does Master Stanley know?" "I have no idea."_

Bijou suddenly dropped the toast just as the maid walked out of the room.

**-**

**-**

In her opinion, her plan was flawless. The window was old, probably the original glass put up whenever this castle was built. It should be able to break easily enough.

And there was even a paper weight on her desk! Breaking the window would be easier than stealing candy from a baby!

So as she picked up the sphere-shaped weight and prepared to lunge it at the colorful glass, she almost smiled bitterly at how excited she was at the thought of doing this.

Bijou wanted to escape and return to Japan. She wanted to reunite with her husband and her friends and her parents and have her life again. But she was afraid that even if she made a run for it, she wouldn't get far at all before she'd be dragged back to this prison, even if it was very sunny outside. If taking her life was the only way out, she'd more than happily do it.

And so without any real hesitation, Bijou tossed the weight into the window, her stomach doing butterflies at the sound of the shards flying and falling all around the broken window.

There was no doubt that someone from the outside saw the window break, or at least heard it, just as she was sure a maid would be rushing in here any moment. Therefore, she had to work fast.

She picked up the shard—oddly enough, a red one—that looked most like a dagger and sighed. She stared for less than two seconds at the bright sun that seemed to be calling her to end this existence and run into its pearly gates.

Bijou held out her wrist quickly. She closed her eyes and brought the shard down as quickly as possible, waiting for the pain to come as she dragged the glass across her wrist.

But the pain never came. Instead, as Bijou opened her eyes, she felt an icy grip around her wrists and met with two lime green missiles.

At that very second, Bijou wished more than anything she would die. _Anything_ was better than the punishment he was sure to give her.

"H-H-How…?!" Bijou choked.

His eyes had large, dark circles beneath them, almost red. And the parts of his arms that were exposed to the sunlight started itching, and soon enough they'd turn red with a rash, eventually eating away at his skin. She of course did not know this.

"Your emotions," Stan snapped, obviously not a morning person as he dragged her away from the window. "I could sense your excitement through my sleep."

Bijou shook anxiously, still trapped with both of his hands grasping her wrists. So he was _that_ attuned to her emotions?! His power wasn't as useless as she thought, after all.

"I knew nothing could make you this excited, so I had to see for myself." He had never sounded so angry with her, nor had his voice ever been so low and snake-like.

"What…what're you gonna do?" she swallowed thickly. For once, he didn't smile or look amused.

His bloodshot eyes narrowed. His grip tightening on her, they once again disappeared out of the room.

**-**

**-**

They flashed into a room about seven times the size of Bijou's, one covered with black curtains and tapestries that blocked all possible light in the room, leaving just one or two of the sun's rays to enter. As Bijou wearily looked at the bed in this room, she noted that a good ten of her could fit side-to-side on such a giant mattress, covered with black silk bedding.

"Your room?" Bijou squeaked, scared as to what they'd do here.

Without answering her question, the man dragged her to his bed and threw her face first into the pillows. Bijou felt his hand wrap around the back of her neck, forcing her face to become more and more deeply buried into the fabric.

"You try anything like that again, and I will come behind you and make you _just like me_, so that any attempt at taking your life will be completely useless. Am I clear?" He was rough and livid, and his touch and voice represented that all too well.

Bijou nodded into the pillow.

"Say it," he jeered, pressing her face in harder.

"You're clear," she said with a mouthful of black silk.

"Say it with my name," he ordered. The pressure on her neck was becoming too much. The lack of oxygen was already getting to her brain.

"You're clear, Master Stanley," she sobbed, hating the way his name sounded.

"Without the title," he pressed, both figuratively and literally.

The last thing Bijou wanted was to be casual and informal with her captor. She realized she'd rather die than give in to him anymore.

"Are you refusing?" he asked after seeing her hesitation, the tips of his fangs on her neck.

Bijou quivered beneath him. Of course, he _wouldn't_ let her die. The only other alternative was to become a monster.

"You're clear, Stanley!" she cried, and immediately, the pressure left her neck. She instantly sat up, gasping for breath as she ran her hands over her abused neck.

Her breath still shallow, she looked over and saw Stan sit down on the other side of the bed, submerging himself beneath the covers.

"Stay," he ordered as his back turned to her, far too tired to deal with her. "And don't think about leaving. There are guards surrounding every possible exit to this room."

Bijou put her back to him as well, her eyes still red from all the crying she had done in the past two days. She didn't get under the covers, though. She pressed her face against the very pillow that could've taken her life, noticing his fresh scent as her eyes closed, also too tired to keep up much longer.

**-**

**-**

He didn't breathe, Bijou realized as she observed him, keeping her distance but watching the lack of his chest rising up and down cautiously.

She had examined her neck a few moments earlier in the spacious bathroom he had attached to his bedroom. Indeed, she could see dark black bruises surrounding the back circumference of her neck. She briefly wondered how he could apply such pressure and not snap her neck in half.

Perhaps she should give in, Bijou thought dismally to herself. There was only so much physical and mental abuse she could take before he'd win. He seemed to get _whatever_ he wanted, and the latest object of his affections was her.

She also wondered what sort of sin she committed to have ended up here.

But most of all, Bijou thought about _him_. He had to miss her. He had to have been searching for her! There was no way either of them could live without each other for this long and not start to panic. And she had been taken so abruptly, too…he had to wonder about that! If he were to ever drop out of her life so suddenly, she'd go insane with worry.

She missed his touch. Two tears raced down both of Bijou's cheeks as she remembered him, less than five days ago, holding her and whispering sweet nothings into her. He was warm and gentle, while Monster was frigid and vicious.

Stan might have been handsome, but there was nothing attractive about him, in Bijou's opinion.

She tried to save her strength, though, for whatever punishment he had in store for her. That would surely come at night once he awoke.

So she once again turned away from him and buried her face into the pillow, wishing more than anything that he could feel her hatred for him but her love for _him_. She prayed the thought would haunt his soulless monster dreams.

**-**

**-**

Bijou woke up on her own, getting up slowly as she propped herself up on her palms. The black curtains to the room had been drawn back, revealing the blue night sky and the full moon.

It was then that Bijou realized she was now under the covers, and that Stan was nowhere to be found.

"You looked cold."

Bijou turned around and noticed Stan standing at the foot of the bed with his back to her. He was fastening up the handcuffs to his jacket.

"Are we going somewhere? To have dinner?" Bijou asked apprehensively as she jumped off of the bed. She was on thin ice as it was. The last thing she could afford was making him mad again.

All Stan did was give her an icy glare as she approached him, freezing Bijou in her tracks.

"_I'm_ going to the library. You're going to stay here for the next three days and nights," he explained.

Bijou nodded dumbly as his words hit her. The next three days. That gave him 72 hours to do with her what he pleased.

"What do I do?" Bijou asked, almost afraid to hear his answer.

With that question, Monster's amused expression returned.

"We'll think of something." He said just as the door swung shut behind him.

**-**

**-**

When he returned from the library some hours later, Bijou was determined to be awake. There was no way she would fall asleep and let him have his way with her.

He came back just as the black of the night was meant to fade away and the pinks and reds and oranges of the morning would start to bloom.

"If you're tired, you should get some sleep," he said nonchalantly as he drew the curtains together.

"What were you doing in the library for so long?" Bijou asked. He had to have been there for a good ten hours, although there were no clocks in this room so she could never be sure.

"Is that any of your business?" he asked harshly as he threw off his jacket. He undid the first few buttons of his dress shirt and collapsed onto the bed.

Bijou looked down. She was simply curious about what he could do for so long reading books, however he was right when he said that it wasn't her business. That would make her come off as an insecure lover.

She did nothing too extravagant herself. She merely memorized every detail of his bedroom, for that's all she _could_ do, unless she wanted to bathe in his luxurious bathroom, but there was no way that would happen (she was always afraid that he would walk in at any moment).

"Why do we wear these clothes?" she finally asked. Stan groaned.

"Because I hate 'modern' fashion. It's tasteless," he explained as he turned around.

Bijou's jaw practically fell off. As if _Stan_ was the epitome of taste!

Bijou decided to end her questions for the night. He seemed like he didn't want anything else to do with her, and that was by far a blessing.

She didn't want to rest under the sheets, but given the cold night outside and the freezing atmosphere that surrounded him, she gave in for the night and buried herself into the black silk.

**-**

**-**

Bijou was awake just a few hours later, watching her captor sleep out of the corner of her eye. Though he claimed to be sleeping, the few times Bijou's thoughts seemed to wander off to her dying, she noticed him turning to her, though his eyes were closed. It happened far too many times to be a coincidence.

Therefore she had nothing to do but wait for her punishment to be handed to her. She was half-expecting him to force himself upon her while she slept, but oddly enough that never happened.

The same maid who brought her breakfast yesterday came in with a tray of food today, and a younger maid followed with another gown in her hands, very similar to the one Bijou already had on but made of some sort of silvery-white fabric.

"Be sure to eat all of it," the maid with the food reminded. The younger maid smiled at Bijou as she laid the gown out for the girl.

Bijou had nothing to say to the maids, so they quickly bowed and left the room. Bijou's eyes narrowed at the tray in front of her.

"Eat it," Bijou nearly jumped out of her seat as she heard his voice. He wasn't looking at her, but instead his face was buried in his palms as he rested his arms against his knees. Even though the massive width of the bed separated them, Bijou could see the dark circles, almost like bruises, under his eyes.

Bijou sighed and went back to her food. She took a sip of the juice; she needed something to force the food down.

-

-

The gown reminded Bijou of the moon.

She refused to change in front of him so she was stuck in his bathroom, which had been stocked with some female toiletries to keep her refreshed. She sat at the small vanity and applied some powder to her face, not for cosmetic reasons—those were the least of her concerns—but mostly so she'd have a sense of hygiene.

She looked down at the way the gown swung around her legs, like a fog almost. She wondered what sort of fabric this was. It felt incredible.

Bijou knew he'd come in here if she took too long, so she finally decided to get up and go back into the bedroom.

When she opened the door she found him setting at his desk, despite it being midday. She also noticed that her lunch had been delivered and rested right beside him on the desktop.

"Tonight," he said, his eyes soaking in the sight of her in the gown as much as they could, "We'll take a walk around the palace."

Bijou looked down and nodded.

"Good girl, now come here," he ordered. The French girl did as she was told, and when he gestured for her to sit at his feet, she collapsed onto her knees in a puff of silver silk.

He picked up a fork and put something onto it…pasta? He held the fork up to her mouth.

Hopelessly, the girl opened her mouth, wondering why Monster was once again making sure she ate, despite his own fatigue.

"I want your energy to be high," he answered, sensing her angered inquisitiveness. "For tonight."

Bijou's throat felt tight, but she took the food down once again, anyway.

**-**

**-**

Tonight she was given a silver cape that fell over her shoulders. It was chilly tonight, as the autumn weather was slowly turning into winter, and she was thankful for it.

Stan had rested after making sure very crumb of her lunch had been devoured, so he was practically skipping down the path that went around the perimeter of the castle. Bijou, sullenly, followed in his shadows.

She felt ridiculous, wearing such a getup and following a man wearing a coat and trousers elaborate enough for a ballet dancer. They belonged more in a movie than they did here.

"The gardens are beautiful in the daylight, but I suppose at night they have an ethereal beauty to them as well," he mused, leading Bijou into a courtyard.

Every stone seemed to be coated in a sensual dusting of gray, save for a fountain whose water bubbled with brilliant blue water. Perhaps a few days ago Bijou would've found the sight to be lovely, but instead she looked down at the hollow face in the water.

"Why did you bring me here?" she asked quietly.

"I thought you'd like some fresh air," he explained, noting to himself that her depression was at an all-time high, or low depending on how one thought of it, tonight.

Bijou shook her head. "No, I mean why didn't you just kill me when you first saw me? Why bring me here and do this to me if you really think I'm your mate?"

Bijou wasn't expecting an answer out of him. In fact, she wasn't even sure she had voiced the last part of her question as her voice was so subdued. Idly, she reached her hand out to touch the water.

"I _know_ you're smarter than that. I'm not going to kill you if you're my mate," he said, observing her as she leaned further over the water. She seemed to be watching one of the fish that resided in it.

"It's because you're my mate that I'm doing this _for_ you," he said, his chilly skin touching her neck.

Bijou hadn't been expecting him to come up right behind her. Startled, she jumped forward unwittingly, only to land face-first into the fountain.

Stan watched as this scene unfolded. His reflexes were fast enough that he could have caught her, with ease, should he choose to. Yet for some reason, he let her fall, perhaps because it was proof of what he could do to her.

However, he realized that maybe there were _other_ reasons to let her have fallen in as he watched he, angry and shivering, rise from the water.

Her cloak was behind her, sticking to the back of her gown like glue. Meanwhile, the rest of her wet gown clung to her body, leaving little to the imagination when it came to her torso area. It didn't hurt that even in the dim light he could see red staining her face like some beautifully-painted doll and the white layers of her hair practically dance at the nape of her neck, dripping wet.

Bijou blinked, refusing the hand Stan had outstretched to her as she somehow managed to pull the ridiculous weight of the gown out of the fountain. She stepped out of it and realized she was unable to shake this wet feeling off of her until she changed her dress.

"I'm going inside; I need to get out of these clothes," she mumbled as she brushed past the vampire's shoulder.

Instantly, Stan was in front of her, looking down at her with lust coating every pigment of his lime green eyes.

"Oh, I couldn't agree more," he explained. He didn't give her a chance to argue as he kissed her, pressing her wet body against his. Bijou resisted, doing as much as she possibly could to get rid of the hold he had on her waist and neck. His touch made her more cold and nervous than she was already.

She whimpered, trying to tell him that she actually had to breathe and could not let this continue. If he understood that fear of hers, he didn't show it as he forced them both to fall on their knees, him still kissing her wildly. Bijou wondered if she stopped squirming would he not realize it when she died? Perhaps that was her escape from here.

Finally, the kiss ended, just when Bijou was sure her lungs could take no more. Out of habit she took a giant breath, still freezing.

Stan barely gave her time to recover as he pushed her down onto the stone of the courtyard. A coppery feeling filled her mouth, and Bijou realized she was feeling fear.

He had snapped the chain of the cape off her neck, throwing it somewhere amongst the flowers. His hands went beneath her, undoing the ties of her corset.

"NO!" Bijou cried, arching her back as she tried to push him off of her. However, that did nothing but tighten her neck in an even more seductive manner and thrust her chest into his face.

"Hmm, you're right. This would probably be faster if I just ripped this thing off of you," Stan said aloud as he eyes the girl he was currently straddling. He really loved the dress on her, but if there was something he loved more, it was the thought of his mate finally becoming _his_.

"_Stop_," Bijou gasped, squirming as much as she possibly could, but as she saw him rip off her left sleeve, she knew there was nothing left to do. She pulled her head back and started to cry, the tears being the only part of her body that was warm.

Stan ripped off her other sleeve, and then, just as he gripped the fabric of the top part of her dress into his hands—

"Stanley."

It was as if a thousand weights had been lifted off of Bijou's shoulders the instant she felt Stan release her dress. She saw Stan's jaw lock, but within a second, Stan was off of her as he faced his sister.

Sandy looked at the boy pitifully.

"Honestly, Stanley, you've been raised properly enough to know to halt all your advances when a woman says 'no'," the girl replied tiredly, crossing her hands across her chest. "Not to mention that she's not like us, Stanley. She'll die from the cold," Sandy reminded, eyes darting to the girl who had just sat up, looking down at the ground and hugging her arms as she shivered.

"And I'm well aware that you were raised with enough class to not interrupt such events," Stan countered.

Sandy ignored his comment and instead appeared before Bijou, kneeling as she offered the shaken girl her hands.

"Come with me, Bijou. I'll take you to your room and get you out of those clothes," Sandy offered, feeling for the first time in over a century, the feeling of sympathy.

"She's to remain in my room, under _my_ care," Stan reminded as he watched Bijou reluctantly grab onto Sandy's hand.

"I'm aware of the punishment you've in mind for her," Sandy said as she helped the girl to her feet. "But her health must be taken into account above all else. She's _your_ mate, Stanley, but you treat her like a disposable toy," She explained with a shake of her head.

With a slight turn of the head, Bijou saw Stan's retreating figure eyeing her hatefully as she walked further and further out of the courtyard.

-

-

"I envy you," Sandy told the girl as she leaned against the bathroom door. "And I can't even remember the last time I felt this feeling."

Bijou was in the middle of pulling on her new dress—a nightgown, thankfully, since sleeping in those gowns tended to be very uncomfortable—as she heard Sandy's words from outside the bathroom.

"Why are you and your brother so caught up about emotions? Can you sense them, too?" Bijou asked quietly.

"No, I don't have the same gift as Stanley. A vampire," Sandy started, "can only feel two emotions with ease: lust and hatred. It is incredibly rare for us to feel anything _within_ that spectrum."

Bijou's eyes lowered in realization as she kicked her other gown to the side of the bathroom, pulling the nightgown as down as it would go (surprisingly, _this_ silky white number was the only piece of "modern" clothing she'd been given; the spaghetti-strapped number barely hit the middle of her thighs!). She went to a brush located atop the bathroom's vanity and slowly started stroking her hair.

"But you are my brother's mate, and so you inspire a whole variety of feelings within him," Sandy said, once again in her monotone.

"I'm not his mate," Bijou replied quickly. "No matter what he thinks, I have someone in Japan—"

"A vampire only has one mate, and I truly believe you are his," Sandy cut in. "The emotions he feels whenever he's around you is proof of that. He would never go to such lengths for you if he didn't feel something different for you."

Sandy moved as she heard Bijou move towards the door. The girl watched as Bijou opened the door and sigh.

"If I'm his mate, then do I have to become a vampire?" Bijou asked quietly. Sandy sat down on Bijou's bed, her knees tucked under her as she closed her eyes.

"Not at this very moment, but yes, eventually," Sandy nodded, yawning.

"And what will happen if I don't?" Bijou snapped. That obviously wasn't the answer she'd been looking for.

"Then you will turn old and die," the vampire reminded. Honestly, why were humans so thick sometimes?

"So what's the big deal if I remain a human if I'm completely happy at the prospect of dying?" Bijou asked as she placed her hands on her silk-covered hips.

"My brother," Sandy started as her eyes trailed back to Bijou, "will go mad at your death, if you are his mate of course."

Bijou looked down. That would certainly explain his refusal to let her kill herself.

"Now come, Bijou," Sandy sighed as she stepped off Bijou's bed. Bijou looked up, confused.

"Where are we going?" she asked nervously. Sandy shook her head at the girl's stupidity.

"I made sure you were out of those wet clothes to keep you alive. Now it is time for you to return to Stan's bedroom," she finished, turning her bored eyes to Bijou.

"No…I-I can't go back there!" Bijou stepped back, panicked. "He'll just, he'll just continue what he was doing before!" she cried.

Sandy shook her head. "He won't. He just lost control and all sense of judgment for a few minutes, but he won't force you to yield to him. If he does, I'll know and put a stop to it."

"No, _please_," Bijou pleaded. "I can't be alone with him…!"

"You need to have a little more faith in me," Sandy explained, walking to the door of the bedroom.

"I can be your greatest ally here," she informed, looking over her shoulder to make sure Bijou would follow.

-

-

"Is it true that human memories fade when you become a vampire?" Bijou asked as she obediently followed Sandy down the hallway, a draft hitting her relatively-exposed body while the negligee brushed against her thighs. She didn't even have shoes on, and her bare feet against the ground just made her shiver all the more.

Though she didn't know it, Sandy smiled sadly. "Indeed. I don't even remember my human life."

"Nothing at all?" Bijou asked, astonished, and frankly, worried.

"I remember ribbons," Sandy admitted. "I think I used to play with ribbons when I was younger."

"Is that all?" Bijou pressed.

"…books," Sandy admitted at length. Before Bijou could inquire what that was about, they reached the door of Stan's bedroom.

Sandy didn't have to knock before Stan opened the door, completely ignoring his sister as his eyes widened happily at the sight of Bijou.

"Please, come in," he said with a bow. Bijou only stiffened at his request until Sandy put her hand on Bijou's back, causing the girl to cringe, as she whispered in the girl's ears.

"Please trust me, Bijou. I will not let him hurt you," she said, nuzzling Bijou's neck in a manner far too affectionate for Bijou's liking. Stan watched the scene unfold with narrowed eyes.

As Bijou tentatively walked into the room, Stan immediately shut the door. Bijou turned around as fast as she could and was relieved to see that he didn't move from the door…yet.

Bijou could hear the roar of a fireplace, and from the corner of her eyes she could see its orange flames.

"I started it to make sure you stayed warm," he told her. "I can't have anything happening to you, after all."

"I'm very tired," Bijou explained as she started backing away, her eyes never leaving Stan. "I'm going to sleep now."

Stan of course had every desire to protest. Had his sister never intervened, the night would have gone _very _differently. However, the one person on the earth he could not disobey was his sister, and therefore he clenched his jaw as tightly as he could.

Why did Sandy choose such a nightgown to put her in?!

Never taking her eyes off of him, Bijou crawled under the covers of the bed, relishing the warmth of the sheets around her. Finally, she turned her head to the side and buried her white head into the pillows.

She knew he'd be beside her less than a few seconds later, his body crawling under the sheets and his arm going over the silk fabric of the comforter to wrap itself around the form of her body.

"Wouldn't you rather go to the library or drink some blood or something?" Bijou asked. The effect of the fireplace seemed to be cancelled out by his close proximity to her.

"No, I'm quite settled right here beside you," he whispered into her hair.

More tears fell, but she conquered her sobs and instead dreamt of coffins and gardens.

-

-

"Do you believe in the afterlife?" Bijou asked the next morning, dressed in a navy blue gown today. She picked at the breakfast that was served to her that morning, having no choice but to chew and swallow for Stan would come and force her to eat again lest he heard her swallow.

Despite having all the curtains drawn and thus having no light in the room, Stan had his arm over his eyes as he lay on his back.

"Cheh. Of course not. This is the only life we've been given," he reminded her. Bijou sighed and tapped her fork idly against the desk she was sitting at.

"Eat," he ordered quickly. Bijou once again turned her eyes to her food.

"But if you were to die," Bijou started just after swallowing another bite of her food. Stan almost laughed at the excitement he felt coming from her as she said those words.

"But I will _not_ die," he pointed out, turning on his side. Bijou's disappointment flooded his brain.

"Well, the sun can kill you, can't it?" Bijou remembered. The excitement peaked again.

"Luckily this part of France only has but a few sunny days in the year," he explained groggily. "And I'd have to stay in it for a good few hours for it to take its full effect." Then came the downward surge.

"And if you don't get enough blood to drink…?" the French girl asked. Once again, there was a flicker of hope.

"I'd have to not drink any sort of blood for well over a year before my body would give out," Stan muttered. This time, Bijou's depression seemed to take over and she sighed. Stan couldn't sense anymore changes in her emotions and figured she had run out of ways to theorize his death.

Until, all of a sudden, curiosity picked at Stan's brain. The vampire groaned.

"But…just imagine that you _did_ die," Bijou started as she took a sip of her juice. "Just pretend," she added before he reminded her that he was immortal.

"Fine. What do you want to ask? I already told you I don't believe in the afterlife," he reminded as he sat up. Why couldn't this girl let him sleep?

"So what will happen to your soul after you die?" Bijou asked quietly. "It has to go somewhere…"

She only looked down for a split-second, but she instantly felt his icy aura surround her. She looked up and saw narrowed green eyes, so tired yet so intimidating at the same time, peering down at her.

"I am a soulless creature. Sandy is a soulless creature, and you, _Cherie_, will be a soulless creature in the very near future," he hissed as his forced her face to look up at him. "We have nothing to pass on to neither heaven nor hell if our bodies were to wither."

He let go of her and she was pushed back against the chair. He turned around, headed back to the bed. With a clenched jaw, Bijou said to his back:

"I think I'll still believe in an afterlife, even if you manage to turn me into one of you," she said softly. "The difference between right and wrong…I don't think I'll be able to let go of that so easily."

Stan barely looked at the girl before he responded, sitting on the bed with his hands covering his bruised eyes.

"When you gain the power of eternity to attain any knowledge this world has to offer, morality becomes an almost childish concept to you," he explained.

Bijou was about to reply, but she forced herself to be quiet. She didn't want to anger him anymore than necessary, as he had warned her that her next stunt would cause her her mortality.

A few moments later, she was sure Stan was asleep. He wasn't tossing and turning like before, nor was he ordering her to finish her meal (admittedly there were only a couple of bites left, but still).

Bijou sighed and got out of the chair. With quiet movements, she went to one of the windows that spanned the height of the wall and moved one of the black curtains slightly to the side.

All she could see in the sky were rain clouds, and not even of different shades of gray. It was one, giant sheet of dirty white that spanned the heavens, almost like a barrier that told her to stay away.

Perhaps Monster was right, and there was no point in believing in a higher power. Maybe there was no heaven or hell beyond this earth.

_And maybe_, Bijou thought as she glanced back at Stan's sleeping figure, _there was such thing as hell _on_ earth_.

-

-

Bijou was never good at keeping track of time when she didn't have a clock, but she knew by this point it had to be past midnight. From what she had seen, by this point in the night he'd have been awake for hours, and yet he hadn't stirred this evening.

Sometime after lunch, Bijou had crawled into the bed and had fallen asleep. Then, as the sky finally started to take on a more ashy experience, the maid had brought in dinner for her. Stan hadn't moved then, nor had she seen anything as small as a muscle twitch from him since he had fallen asleep after their conversation.

As she ate her dinner, she realized that the circles beneath Stan's eyes weren't moving. Normally they'd disappear as he got more and more rest, but tonight they seemed to linger on his pale skin.

And still, hours after her dinner tray had been carried away, he hadn't woken up once. Bijou couldn't help but feel a small feeling of excitement as she realized this was her second night here. Tomorrow, hopefully, she would be returned to her bedroom!

Though that beautifully warm feeling was pushed away as she pressed her cheek harder against her pillow. So what if her punishment technically ended tomorrow? She was still his prisoner, and until the day came where she would leave this castle for good, there was no reason in hoping.

Suddenly, the door to the room opened, and Bijou's eyes widened. She pursed her lips together and pretended to not make a sound.

Two people, it sounded like men from their heavy footsteps and the grunts they made, came into the room. They dropped something on the ground, something heavy, and left as quickly as they had come.

The second the door shut, Bijou wanted to bolt up and see exactly what they had dropped off. However, Stan got up before she could. He must have known she was awake, for he could no doubt sense her curiosity. However, Bijou chose to keep quiet. If this matter didn't concern her, then she would be a fool to get herself involved.

"Hmm," she heard the sound leave Stan's mouth. From the sound of his footsteps, Bijou imagined him to be walking in a circle. The seconds seemed to drag on, but Bijou's curiosity was peaking. _What was he doing?!_

"If you must know, then you can watch," Stan said, not looking up from what was on the floor.

Bijou wanted to stay down. Her mind was practically screaming at her to remain still. She wasn't necessary in whatever he was doing, and for that she should be thankful.

And Bijou was going to stay down, until she heard a whimper that definitely did _not_ come from Stan.

The girl shot up and scrambled to the end of the bed; her worst fear would be him taking the life of another human right in front of her, perhaps like a foreshadowing of what she was to become someday.

Thankfully, what Bijou saw wasn't a human on the floor. However, her heart still ached for the tranquilized doe whose body could still be seen heaving out its painful breaths.

Stan was on his knees. The curtain on the far side of the room had been drawn, leaving the light from the light blue night sky to fall on Monster and his prey like some sort of twisted spotlight. Stan picked up the animal by its neck, and Bijou could still see the shine of its eyeball as it shifted its eyes nervously, not knowing what was going on.

"Wait!" Bijou practically jumped off the end of the bed, her white nightgown flailing behind her as she ran to Stan.

"Please," she pleaded as she sat on her knees before the animal. Stan looked up, slightly annoyed at the delay she was causing him in his meal.

With a trembling hand, she grabbed Stan's hand and looked at him as sincerely as she could.

"Kill it first," she begged. The animal looked miserable as it was. The last thing she wanted was to see its soul slowly be sucked out of it as its sustenance simultaneously was stolen.

Despite how cold she was, she pressed both of her hands around his, bringing one of his hands against her chin.

Stan looked confused, wondering why the girl cared so much about the pain of an animal. Nevertheless, he smiled at her initiation of contact with him.

"Alright, _Cherie_, if that's what you wish," he said, putting on a pitiful smile. Wordlessly and effortlessly, he took his other hand and snapped the deer's neck, like he was closing a book.

Bijou immediately released Stan, her eyes watching in disbelief as the deer's eyes instantly closed. Not more than two seconds later, Stan's fangs had come out and were sucking the blood out of the deer's aortic artery.

She covered her mouth, feeling her dinner coming up. With a disgusted sound and tears in her eyes, she dashed to the bathroom, slamming the door behind her. Stan, all the while, smirked, digging his fangs in deeper.

-

-

"Stan asked me to spend the day with you," Sandy announced, coming into the bedroom the next morning.

Bijou turned around, surprised. She was finishing her breakfast, sitting at the desk where she had been since last night. After she had emerged from the bathroom, she refused to sleep on the bed and got changed into her navy gown instead.

The breakfast tray was in Bijou's lap, as Monster had placed the remaining carcass of the deer on the desk after seeing Bijou sit there. Bijou refused to look at it.

"Now?" Bijou asked. To say that she was perplexed would be a sore understatement. It was still early morning, and despite whatever sort of makeup Sandy had decided to put on her face, dark black circles were still evident under the girl's eyes.

Bijou turned to her side and saw Stan sitting up. He nodded his head briefly at Bijou's curious stare. Bijou bitterly noted the lack of circles under his eyes, most likely a result of the dinner he had last night.

She quickly turned away from him. Bijou set the tray on the floor and got out of the chair, following Sandy out of the room.

-

-

"Stan seemed to enjoy his meal. The idiot doesn't eat as often as he should," Sandy explained over her shoulder as she led Bijou down a corridor that had all its windows covered with dark curtains. It was impossible to see more than a few feet in front of you, but Sandy seemed to be doing just fine.

Bijou remained quiet. The deer's lifeless eyes still caused her to cringe.

"You may be against it right now, but soon craving blood will be as natural to you as breathing," Sandy voiced. "Once you feel the beating of something's blood against its skin, you go crazy with bloodlust."

Here, Sandy stopped. Her back was still to Bijou, but Bijou could just imagine the crazed look the girl was getting in her eyes. Her voice was getting higher and higher pitched.

"It's irresistible, especially when you can smell the sweetness of the blood from kilometers away! Humans especially…their blood was made to satisfy our tastes…and when you find your mate…"

Sandy turned around slowly, her eyes soaking in every feature of the girl's face.

"I have no idea," Sandy drawled, "how my brother manages to keep from biting you every night. You may not be my mate," suddenly, her hands were against Bijou's jugular vein, "but even _I_ can tell that your blood is possibly the sweetest I've ever come across."

Bijou looked down and to the side, doing her best to not make a sound as the girl's icy hands ran across the skin of her neck.

"I guess he must be serious when he says that this is a courtship process," she smiled, tilting her head to the side. Bijou's stomach turned again. If _this_ was courtship, she feared what these monsters thought of as 'cruelty'.

"I believe he's doing his best to inculcate his presence into your mind," Sandy continued, touching her nose to Bijou's. "He cannot rush with turning you into a vampire, despite his threats," she added.

At this, Bijou's eyes snapped back to the girl's. Sandy was almost getting high off the girl's fear and curiosity. She could see now why Stan was so drawn to this human. Even though her ability to sense emotions was juvenile compared to Stan's, even she could feel the pits of Bijou's stomach flurry with excitement!

"Ahh, yes! How to explain…Well, the moment he brought you here, Stan couldn't turn you into a vampire. A human's mind needs to be almost _trained_—although that's probably not the best word—to enter the vampire lifestyle. Nine out of ten times the human will die during the vampirification."

Bijou's eyes widened. So there was a chance, a very high chance, that she would never be turned into a monster?! The thought was amazing enough to cause Bijou's heart to beat faster.

"Ohh," Sandy laughed sadly, holding the girl's head between both of her hands, "I _wish_ you were a man, but even that isn't entirely necessary," Sandy said as she pressed her forehead to the girl's.

Bijou pulled her head back, though Sandy's hands were now on Bijou's wrists.

"Where are we going?" Bijou asked quietly.

Sandy sighed at the girl's refusal of her advances. Bijou was starting to wonder how vampires could sigh without any breath, anyway…

"Stanley has some business to take care of, and he'd prefer it if you weren't with him," the strawberry-blonde beauty explained. She let go of Bijou and turned around. With slow movements, the vampire started moving forward.

Bijou continued to follow behind the girl. Whatever business Stan had that was not meant for Bijou's eyes, Bijou did not care for. _But he was doing it now, in the morning?_ However, that didn't answer Bijou's original question as to where they were going.

"I was thinking the library," Sandy mused. "Yes, perhaps you could spend the day reading books."

-

-

Thankfully, by the time Bijou had returned from the library that afternoon, the deer carcass had been removed from the desk. Stan was nowhere in sight either, so Bijou sighed with relief as she took a seat and started reading the book.

She had no idea why Sandy would've possibly suggested a book that taught her to subdue her emotions, or even why a book on forcing away emotions was ever written, but she was thankful and she eagerly took in the words on the pages.

If she could learn to control her excitement to the degree that neither Stan nor Sandy could sense it, she could very easily escape from this castle. She'd had to concoct an elaborate plan, and it'd have to be during the day, but given enough time, this could actually happen. Whatever happened in the end, however, she _could not_ let Stan attempt at turning her. Although she was comforted with the fact that she would most likely die before becoming a vampire herself, she didn't want to die. She wanted to return to her family and friends no matter what.

"_Cherie_, your excitement is almost tangible." Bijou stiffened as Stan's hands massaged her shoulders.

Bijou fought back her repulsion and continued to scan the lines on the page.

"Reading about emotions? Honestly, humans have no idea what they're talking about when they talk about their own feelings," Stan frowned, taking but a glance at the words Bijou was reading. His hands folded under her chest.

"Why don't you put that book away? I can teach you more about emotions in a few hours than wasting the entire day on such garbage," he whispered to her.

Bijou squirmed and was surprised when he let go of her. "When you turn me into a vampire, I'll lose the ability to feel all those emotions you cherish me for," Bijou reminded. "And won't that make you sad?" Bijou asked calmly as she continued reading.

Before she knew it, the book was thrown somewhere to the side and Bijou and Stan's faces were a centimeter apart.

"It's not so much about the emotions I sense in you as much as it is the emotions you cause in _me_. That won't change whether you're a vampire or a human," He reminded.

"But when you try to turn me, there's a ninety-percent chance that I'll die, isn't there?"

Her words were almost like a warning to Stan. Though Sandy hadn't outright said it, her explanation made it obvious that an unsatisfied Bijou would cause a greater chance that she'd die instead of turn.

Stan smirked as he pulled away. "I don't fail at anything I do. When I turn you, you'll awake a vampire."

Bijou glared, soaking her mind with her hatred for this man. He just kept smiling and smiling.

The door opened. Stan moved away from Bijou in time to see a maid walk over with Bijou's lunch in her hands.

Bijou turned away from the vampire and looked at the meal served to her. It looked like some sort of soup with a side salad.

"Drink your soup," Stan ordered as he stood behind her. Bijou pulled the chair closer to the desk and picked up a spoon, getting some of the broth and a brown chunk that Bijou thought was a potato into the utensil. As Bijou swallowed the contents of the spoon and chewed, she realized something.

"What type of meat is this?" she asked, chewing the chunk she thought was a potato. It was so tender…perhaps veal? Stan's hands were on her shoulders as he whispered into her ear.

"What do you think, _Che-rie_?"

Bijou's eyes widened. She almost choked as she swallowed the piece of meat.

"I can't eat this!" she cried as she started standing, only to be forced down into her seat so hard that her entire back erupted in pain.

"Oh no, _Dearest,_ you're going to drink everything in that bowl and love every bit of it." He put a spoon with an especially chunky piece of deer meat up to her face.

"Mmm—_NO_! I'd rather die or be turned than eat something you killed!" Bijou smacked the spoon away. She shut her eyes tightly, expecting a physical punishment for her disobedience.

For a few seconds, she thought she had won this battle. He could not let her die, nor could he risk turning her at this point (she would most likely die, anyway). She foolishly thought that he would leave her be and not force her to eat.

However, those thoughts evaporated as he pulled her hair back, forcing her head to look up at the ceiling.

"What a shame," Stan thought aloud, pressing her jaw muscles so hard that her mouth was forced open. "The cooks spent so much time on it just for you, too…"

With that said, he took the bowl of soup and tilted it, forcing the liquid down her mouth. Bijou's eyes pooled with tears as he pressed just the right muscles on her neck to cause her to chew and swallow. Much of the broth spilled down her clavicle and onto her dress, but Stan didn't care.

A moment later, when all the liquid in the bowl had disappeared, Stan threw the bowl onto the tray, releasing Bijou's hair.

"Go back to your room; there is no need for you to return until I come for you," he explained, walking into his bathroom. "Clean yourself up. Your punishment is over."

Bijou cried as she sloppily wiped all remnants of the soup off her mouth with her hands. Not wanting him to see her so fragile, she ran out of the room, running down the corridor to her chambers, hoping that every vengeful thought she had of him pierced his soulless body.

-

-

Bijou didn't clean herself up. She ran into her room, not noticing the new stained-glass window, as she slammed her door shut. She ripped off her clothes, not wanting anything that was tainted by that soup on her. She pulled on a nightgown that had been laid on her bed. She climbed into the bed, sobbing, not bothering to conceal her screams.

When the maid came with the dinner later that night, Bijou waited for her to leave before she threw all the food down the toilet and flushed it away. She did the same with the breakfast that came the next morning, not feeling an ounce of excitement as she did so. All she could feel was hatred and despair.

-

-

She didn't feel any better later that day. The lunch that had some had also been flushed down the toilet, and amazingly enough, the maids suspected nothing. If they did, Monster would've come in here and would have forced her to eat, perhaps making and serving her more of that meat.

Bijou tilted her head back as she lay in the tub. She used to be so full of life just a week ago. She was so happy and woke up every day with a smile on her face in _his_ arms. Her life was perfect.

Maybe _that_ was the sin that had caused her to end up here, a lack of appreciation for the life she led before.

She cried some more as she ran her fingers through her still-dry hair. The maids had laid out a new dress for her on the bed, a green gown if she remembered correctly. And Stan hadn't come to her room last night or bothered her once today. Perhaps he really was going to leave her alone.

And yet, that thought didn't cause any sort of positive emotion in Bijou. Somewhere during the experience of forcing the soup down her mouth, Bijou snapped. She no longer needed a book to tell her how to push away her emotions. That had, by some miracle, happened on its own. She spent sometime this morning wondering if she had somehow become a vampire, quickly dismissing that thought due to its lunacy.

That's when a thought hit her. If she could no longer feel excitement herself, she wondered…

Yes…maybe it would work.

She started to sink her head into the water, letting her white hair first float on its surface, then gently started to lower it, deeper and deeper. Soon her nose was a good few inches from the surface, and everything outside the water appeared blurry to her.

If she believed there was any other alternative, she would have taken it. But up until this point, she knew this was inevitable.

Bijou felt her lungs constrict. Her apathy remained, however, and this could only be a good thing. She decided to count to 100 in head, positive that she'd be dead before she reached the centennial number.

Just as she reached 57, she felt her body start to tingle for air. Her eyes closed as a satisfied smile made its way to her face, and the inside of her heart could feel the faintest speck of happiness.

When she got to 93, she saw her world go black.

-

-

Bijou turned happily as she slept, feeling more refreshed and amazing than she had in _days_. She smiled to herself, relishing the feeling as she hugged the sheets to herself.

Heaven seemed like a wonderful place. So soothing, so relaxing…and so…she tried to think of another word as her emerald eyes fluttered open, seeing the pink sheets around her.

…

_Pink Sheets_…

Her eyes shot open as she scrambled up. She was in her room! She was alive…

She was _saved_!!! _Noooo!!! _

Her hair was still wet on her neck, and she looked down to see her wearing nothing but the sheet of her bed, which she held tightly to her chest.

"I do not know what it takes…"

For a few seconds, all Bijou could hear was her heart's beating as she stupidly stared ahead, not wanting to turn around and meet the source of those words.

"…to get you to _obey me_!"

Cringing, the girl finally turned her head. Stan's hands gripped the wood at the end of her bed. His head was lowered, his sleeves messily rolling down his forearms, as if they had been bunched up to his elbows but decided to rebel. His hands were wet. Had _he_ pulled her out…?

As he finally raised his head and made eye-to-eye contact with the girl, he did nothing but send a seething glare at her.

Bijou gulped. There was nothing she could do at this point. She had disobeyed him far too many times than she knew he'd forgive.

"I have a present for you," he explained as he released the footboard. Oddly enough, he walked in the opposite direction of the bed.

"You want it, don't you?" he asked with his back to her.

"…y-yes!" she said timidly, nodding her head as forcefully as she could. His present could be any number of things, and none of them would end well for the girl in any manner. Unfortunately, she knew she no longer had the option to refuse.

At her agreement, Stan left the room, not turning back once to see the girl.

She didn't realize she'd been holding her breath until she released it, her breathing a little shallow as she fell on her back. With trembling hands, she turned to her side and buried her face into her shaking digits.

-

-

-

-

-

_--hugs Stan-- _Oh my beautiful Stanley! What have I done?!!

I really do not know why I wrote this.

I understand if many of you are thinking, "What the hell is wrong with her?!" and again, I'm truly very, very sorry.

It only gets worse from here, trust me. I've written this entire story, and this chapter is more or less a prelude to how dark this story will be. If you think Stan was bad this chapter, just wait until Part II, and then_ --shudders-- _

I guess the only valid reason I can give for writing this is that I wanted to try something new? But I completely understand if I get flamed to no end for this! I will happily take this story down if anyone feels it's too gory! I understand, really!

But with that, I'd appreciate some criticism, please? So if you'd please, please review? It means a lot!

-CN

(Once again, so very, very, very sorry.)


	2. Part II: Lamentation

**Anditends-**Thanks for the compliment! As for Stan and Sandy's sire, that's very important, or at least that is a subplot of its own, but that will be addressed in the very last chapter. As for Bijou developing Stockholm Syndrome…I have to ask, do you really think it's possible?

**Crystalgurl101-**I wrote this story, then I almost deleted it. Then I had my sisters read it. They told me I was the strangest person ever for writing a vampire fic for Hamtaro, but they also told me that they really liked it and wanted to see me post it. If it weren't for them, I would've deleted the fic because of its darkness. But thank you for the compliments. Hopefully, this chapter leaves a similar effect for you. As for Sandy…she's not very prominent in this chapter (I'll tell you right now), but wait. Her backstory's in here and…yeah…That's last chapter…

**PyrroNeko-**"The Clouds of Iniquity"? Hmm I suppose iniquity fits better, but I was going for "The Clouds of Perdition", and by Perdition, I mean the Renaissance term for Hell. Bijou calls Stan "Monster" because that's the only term that fits for her—she does not see him as one that's worth calling by his first name, though I suppose there is some twisting in there to make Bijou a bit of a rebel as you put it. Thank you for reading and giving me a well-thought out review. It's what I needed to inspire me to post the next parts.

**Sandyandmaxwellfanatic-**I'm sorry, but the part about Sandy's backstory is explained in the very last chapter, towards the very end, so you'll have to wait! You'll like some parts of it, and not so much others…lol I could never compare this fic to Twilight only because..ughh…the happiness and beauty and love conquers all theme was not what I wanted to convey at all. Plus, Stan burns in the sunlight, not sparkles!

**Satu-Suzu-**My first reviewer!! I saw the email telling me a review came for this story, and I debated opening it and reading it, but my curiosity got to the best of me and I must thank you. I got the Beauty and Beast vibe, too, actually when I wrote their first dinner scene, but I highly, highly doubt anything upcoming is similar to Disney…

**X00-**Thank you for your sweet compliment! I'm glad you liked what you read so far!

And thank you all for reviewing! It means a lot and shows me your loyalty, so I must apologize in advance. You'll see why when you read this chapter.

I've also decided to cut this fic into four chapters instead of three, only because I realized chapter three would be around 80 pages long, so I split up chapter three. Chapter two, this chapter right here, is the shortest one, though most pivotal.

One more thing, all I did when I wrote this chapter was listen to Barlow Girl's "Never Alone" over and over and over again. It's literally the only thing I listened to, and it completely set the mood for the chapter. I recommend giving it a listen before (or during) the reading of this chapter.

**CN**

**Les Nuages de la Perdition**

**Part II: **_Lamentation_

-

-

-

-

-

For the next three weeks, Bijou wasn't alone, yet she never felt so lonely in her life.

The maids would come and deliver her meal and dress for the day. They would stay and make sure she ate every last bite of it before leaving. Then, sometime after lunch, they'd tell her to take her daily bath. They went as far as going into the bathroom with her and watching her every move, giving her no privacy.

After she was served dinner, the maids would stay with her throughout the night, sleeping on blankets on the floor of either side of her bed. If she got up, they'd know.

But the problem was, aside from telling her to eat and to bathe, they never spoke to her. Even if Bijou tried to start a conversation, the maids would do nothing but give her a weak smile.

She wasn't let out of the room, ever. She never asked because she knew the answer would be a terse, "No".

Stan never came to her during those days. Not once. The maids never spoke of him, and Sandy didn't come, either. Bijou was happy in some aspects, though despite the fact that he was a monster, she couldn't help but miss the lack of conversation.

Maybe this was her punishment? No…she wanted to hit herself for her obvious stupidity. She knew her punishment, or "gift" as Stan called it, was going to be something she could never forget.

By the second week, Bijou had stopped talking and had stopped initiating conversations with the maids. She followed the routine set for her obediently. There was no need to stir up more trouble.

She didn't know why there were no clocks in any part of the building. She didn't see the problem with being able to tell time. The only way she knew how many days had passed was by counting the sunrises.

Bijou kept the curtains open, because she liked staring out at the sky. Perhaps the only things she could see were the clouds, but she didn't seem to mind. She lay in bed between her meals, her cheek pressed against the pillows, as she stared blankly at them.

During the third week, Bijou had brought her desk's chair up to the window, and while the maids took turns watching her from beside the door, she'd just stare. The maids were positive she was purposefully trying to drive herself insane by looking at nothing but a gray sky, and weren't sure if this was something Master Stanley needed to know.

But Bijou had no ulterior motive for looking at the sky. She started viewing it as a sheet where she played out the memories of her past.

-

-

Bijou stared down at her lap. Her eyes had become a little strained after looking up for so long, so she focused her attention to the gown she was wearing today. It was bright red. She had been given a matching ribbon with it this morning, something she tied around her neck like a bow instead of her hair. She was going for the noose look.

She had counted twenty-five sunrises since her failed attempt at drowning herself. She had briefly wondered during the first few days if Stan ever intended on talking to her again. There was that whole issue about her being his mate and turning her, after all. But she had long-since forgotten about those facts and instead focused on not losing her mind.

She wasn't sure how well she was faring, though.

Bijou heard the door slam, and she turned around. When she wasn't sleeping, the maids would stay, one at a time, in her room to keep an eye on her. Now, the last maid had just left, and she was left all alone.

Bijou returned to examining her dress and sighed, sinking deeper into her chair. She figured one of them would return in a few moments. In the meantime, she started picking any loose threads off the hem of her sleeve.

"You should smile more often. This sullen disposition suits you poorly," a voice spoke into her ear while two cold hands rested on her shoulder blades.

Bijou gasped, quickly turning around and staring at his lime-green eyes.

She tried to speak, say something like "You!", but her voice was so weak after not being used for so long that nothing but a low sound of surprise came out as she stared at him.

"I like surprise," Stan told her coolly as his hands left her shoulders. "It's better than hatred, or disgust, at the very least."

Bijou's mouth remained open as she stood up, nervously pushing the chair away. When his hands left her, she felt loneliness sweep over her all over again. It wasn't that she missed _Stan's_ touch, but just contact in general. But to show him otherwise, Bijou tied her hands in front of her, keeping her head lowered.

"Remember that gift I promised you?" Stan asked. Bijou looked up and felt her heartbeat rise. She was all alone with him, and he was bringing up her "gift".

Nevertheless, Bijou nodded. "…yes…" she half-coughed as her voice finally made it through.

"Well it's time for you to receive it. You _are_ still interested, aren't you?" he asked as he amusedly tilted his head to the side.

At this, Bijou could only be more confused. The way he asked the question, Bijou was sure that if she refused his gift, she'd be sorry, but she couldn't imagine _what_ he could possibly give her that she wouldn't reject immediately.

But she pressed her lips shut anyway and nodded.

"Wonderful." His bright smile was anything but the word he just spoke. "Shall we?"

He offered his arm to her—so they were going somewhere?—, and Bijou took it, biting her lip.

-

-

Stan didn't speak one word as he led Bijou down a new corridor, gripping her arm tightly as they made their way down a set of stairs that twisted like a nautilus shell.

Bijou made a disgusted sound as the smell of decay and rotting flesh filled her nose. Ultimately she had no choice but to cover her nose and mouth with her hands and hold her breath.

"Ahh, _Cherie,_ you will habituate to the smell in a few minutes. The smell is actually one of the trivial things about the dungeon," Stan said with nothing short of happiness in his tone.

Bijou looked to the side, tears of shock and pain from the smell falling down her cheeks. She had no idea what could possibly be in the dungeon…perhaps a thousand deer carcasses? Or was this where the Monsters did their turning ceremonies?

The girl whimpered at the horrible thoughts that filled her mind, everyone being almost twice as worse as the last.

They must've gone down about three-hundred steps, and finally they reached a landing where a single torch lit up the small area. There was an ancient, dirty gate that had a guard located on both sides. From what Bijou could tell, there was no light inside the area that the gate guarded.

"Now when we go in, you will stay by my side and keep quiet. Do you understand?" Stan asked as his grip on the girl's arm tightened.

Bijou knew she'd try to make a run for it, and he obviously figured as much as well. With a defeated sigh, she looked at Stan's arm, not being able to stare him in the eye anymore, and nodded.

"Good girl," Stan cooed. Bijou could see him nod to the guards out of her periphery vision. The guards, in turn, started pushing two levers that were located on both sides of the gate. The gate started to rise as an even more pungent stench carried into the room.

"_Oh my God!_" Bijou gasped as more tears fell uncontrollably out of her emerald eyes. She had no idea how Stan could be so immune to it.

She knew, she just _knew_, that Monster had a smile on his face as he dragged her into the dark chamber.

They moved deeper and deeper into it. They walked for a few minutes, and amazingly enough, Bijou did indeed find herself becoming desensitized to the horrible odor. That just left more room for worry about what Stan intended to do.

Bijou had no idea it was already dark, but as she walked into a circular stone room that was littered with broken animal bones, she saw through a small crack in the ceiling, a good thirty feet above them, that the light blue sky of the early night had come out.

"You remember what I said about being quiet, right?" Stan asked, staring straight ahead at nothing. Bijou nodded.

"I intend to make you keep your word," he explained as he stepped to the side, revealing a figure at the far, far end of the room, with both his hands cuffed behind his back to the stone walls.

She didn't care what she had just promised Monster. She let out an ear-shattering cry as she immediately broke away from Stan, running as fast as she possibly could to the man.

Stan sighed, and within a second, he appeared beside her and grabbed her by the waist, stopping her in her tracks.

".Go," Bijou snarled as her eyes stayed glued to her husband's body.

"Can't do that, _Cherie_. You made a promise, remember?" Stan reminded.

"I DON'T CARE!" Bijou squirmed as hard as she could against his grip, but he remained firm. "I need to see him," she cried as she looked at his chained body. He couldn't be more than twenty feet away from her at this point! Why wasn't he responding or looking up to the sound of her voice?!

"Are you sure?" Stan asked, looking quite bored as Bijou kept itching to break free. "It will cost you."

Bijou's chest heaved up and down as she heard Stan's last four words. She knew _exactly_ what he meant, and he knew she knew.

Bijou's breaths still hitched with her tears. "You bastard…"

Stan sighed, though a smile was on his face. "And here I actually believed your words about 'being in the heart'—"

"Yes…I'm sure." She cut him off, no doubt in her mind.

"Is that a promise?" Stan asked.

Bijou's eyes remained locked. "I promise." The truth was, it didn't matter if she promised or not. He'd take his 'price' for bringing her here, regardless.

Stan's icy arms let her go, and making Olympic runners look slow, Bijou ran the length of the dungeon to her husband's form.

With tears in her eyes, she collapsed on both knees to his level. His head was still lowered; he wasn't looking at her, though she was right there!

Gently, Bijou took his face into her hands and lifted it. She released a deep breath when she realized he was still alive, but just barely.

His blue eyes seemed to widen slightly at the sight of her. But his cheeks were sunken in, as if he hadn't been fed in…

"How long have you been here?" Bijou cried as tears fell from her face onto her husband's.

"A little over three weeks," Stan said nonchalantly, remaining yards behind her but hearing her with crystal-clear accuracy.

_Three weeks?_ Bijou's eyes widened.

"_Stanley has some business to take care of, and he'd prefer it if you weren't with him…"_

Stan could feel Bijou's fury start to rise, and just as she turned her head to glare at the vampire, something called out to her and all traces of negative feelings vanished.

"..Bi…jou…" His voice was so coarse, barely audible. However, that didn't matter to Bijou as she hugged him. Her elation was the purest thing in that rancid dungeon.

"_Yes!_" she cried as tears of happiness fell freely from her. Her face was buried into his shoulder as her soft cries echoed in the room.

His breathing was shallow, as if a heavy weight was compressing his chest. "You..died?" he asked in between breaths, his head barely lifted and his eyes downcast with fatigue.

His voice…his words! She missed speaking in Japanese so much!

"No, no!" Bijou said excitedly, smiling despite the somber situation around her. She forgot reality for a moment as she showed her husband her face and beamed. Her happiness filled the room like the steam of a sauna, and it was almost a choking feeling for the vampire who hadn't felt anything at this level ever, as far as he could remember.

"I'm right here, see?" her smile started to break as her eyes swelled with water. She wiped some of the dungeon dirt off of his face, softly lifting his face to stare at his blue eyes.

For a moment, his eyes seemed so squint slightly. It was as if he was identifying her all over again. Finally, the corners of his lips twisted ever-so-slightly to form the faintest of smiles.

"I'm…happy," he said at length. In those short words, she could hear the lingering sounds of his charismatic voice coming through.

"So am I," Bijou whispered. She leaned forward and kissed him softly on the lips, something Monster watched from the shadows. In the pits of his mind the question flickered on and off: Would she ever do that for me?

When Bijou pulled back she wiped the tears away with the back of her hand. "More than anything, so am I."

"Have you eaten?" she asked as she traced his cheekbones with her fingers. They were so visible.

He shook his head to the best of his ability. "No…just…twice," the man winced as he remembered his torturous first few days here, writhing in pain and starvation as these supernatural creatures laughed at his misery.

Bijou nodded softly, but inside her blood was boiling. While the love of her life had food withheld from him, she was having food shoved down her throat. It made her want to wretch.

"They give me water," the man finally said. His eyes briefly went past Bijou's kneeling figure and to the…_thing_…standing so far away, yet his hatred showing on every feature of his pale face. Hatred for _him_. The man glanced back to his wife, unable to look at the creature any longer, and finally noticed her attire.

"Beautiful, Bijou," he said simply. He had always liked her in red.

"Thank you," the girl responded. Internally her world was falling. The thought that kept whirling around in her brain was how long he could survive in his current state…and how he managed to survive at all in the first place, not that she was complaining about the latter.

Bijou steeled herself. She took a deep breath and held it, shutting her eyes tight as her fists clenched. As she released her breath, she turned her head to the side. She didn't look at the monster, she simply spoke.

"He needs food," she pleaded, her words returning to French. "Give him some."

"My, you're observant, _Cherie_," The vampire skulked as he slithered out of the shadows and walked to the girl, his every step a lion's saunter.

"No—Bijou—" her husband was determined as he stared up at the monster. It was obvious the man would rather die than owe his life to such a horrid creature.

"He won't survive much longer. Food won't do any good at this point," Stan reminded, putting his hand on his chin as he thought, though not very deeply.

"It will if he's given the proper treatment," Bijou pressed as she finally looked up at the vampire.

Stan didn't look very amused. "I see no benefit in helping him."

"If he dies, _I_ die," Bijou snapped as one of her hands instinctively reached out and grabbed her husband's hand. "My emotions and my will to live all go with him." Stan knew what that meant. If she shut her mind down and rejected the passion for life, her vampirification would undoubtedly fail and he'd lose her as well.

"_Please,_" Bijou begged, despite feeling the slight pressure of her husband's grip telling her to stop. It took so much out of her to sound so desperate, however, both males in the room seemed to underestimate her desire to keep her husband alive.

"You should let him wither away in peace," Stan said as he turned around. He kept walking away until Bijou's voice called out.

"_Please_," she choked out again. "…I'll do anything."

In a second, Stan was kneeling in front of her, one of his icy hands on her neck. Bijou's husband could do nothing but watch with narrowed eyes as the monster taunted her in _their_ native tongue.

"Oh, you've already promised me 'anything', _Cherie_," he reminded. "I don't need to give him any food to get exactly what I desire."

The French girl pursed her lips together. She couldn't look up, either at him or her husband so she continued to watch as tears fell into her lap.

"I-I won't try to kill myself anymore, and I'll eat all my food and…and when you turn me, I'll let you with every desire to survive and come out just…just like you!" she cried as her emerald eyes finally looked up at the vampire.

"…Bijou…!" for her husband, it was like reliving the past three weeks just hearing what she tried to do to herself while she was here with this monster. And what was worse, the monster wanted _his_ precious wife to become one of them!

The girl couldn't look at her husband out of guilt as she continued to lock her eyes with the monster.

Stanley, on the other hand, looked at the other man apathetically. He sighed again as the man glared at him. Had he the strength, and if his hands weren't chained to the wall, of course, Stan could imagine the man trying to lunge at him in a fight to the death. He smiled at the thought of fighting a human. _Such_ an uneven battle.

His smile just unnerved Bijou all the more.

"Do take note of my generosity, _Cherie_. First I let you see your unfortunate husband and now I will give him food. It's really a two for one special," he said as he stood.

Bijou's head fell, "Thank you, Master Stanley." Bijou's husband made a hissing sound as he heard how she called him.

"Now come," Stanley ordered. Bijou looked up. The girl couldn't believe she was being asked to leave her husband.

"We have a long night planned, or have you already forgotten?" the vampire reminded, much to the girl's chagrin. He wanted to do this _tonight_!

"..But…" Bijou trailed off, her eyes darting to her husband, who could only return her stare with just a confused expression as she.

"He will be fed in the meantime, I will make sure of it," Stan explained as his hand outstretched to Bijou's face.

"N-n-no!" Bijou's eyes darted from the icy fingers in front of her to her husband. "I can't just leave him!"

"Didn't I just say that he will be taken care of?" When Bijou did nothing but grasp her husband's hand, tightly, while her eyes continued to look longingly at his abused form, Stan's lips formed a tight line.

"Really, _Cherie,_ you're in no position to deny anything," Monster taunted.

"Can I at least see if he'll get food?" Bijou pleaded.

"You don't trust me." Stan feigned being hurt by putting a hand over his unbeating heart.

"I don't care if I die, Bijou," Bijou looked as if she'd seen a ghost when she heard her husband speak.

"Stop! You're too weak get overworked!" she cried as she squeezed his hands.

"I don't care," her husband repeated. "But don't give into him."

"…!" Bijou wanted to speak, she wanted to tell him that she'd always be his, always and forever…like their wedding vows…but nothing seemed to come out, despite her mouth being fully open and her brain demanding that she protest. Her husband had no idea what to make of her hesitation. Had she already given herself to him? Was she going to become a vampire tonight? These questions kept stabbing into him with every silent second that passed.

Unfortunately, monster took this as his cue to speak.

"The only reason she ever agreed to yield to me was because of you," Stanley explained, speaking in Japanese for the first time. Bijou's husband glared at him and jolted somewhat forward, but Bijou pushed his chest back in an effort for him to conserve his energy.

"She resisted all my advances. Every single one of them, in fact. But she collapsed like a tower of cards once she saw you. There was no hesitation there, not for one second."

"Stop it!" Bijou wept, her white bangs sweeping over her downward-pointed face like curtains. This guilt trip Stan was sending her husband on did nothing but break Bijou more and more. She neither felt worthy of her husband's affections nor did she ever want to see Monster again.

"Bijou, don't—" her husband said softly, trying to tell her that he wasn't mad at her, for he could see guilt written in her every action. However, an impatient Stan grabbed Bijou's arm, and before the French girl knew it, she was pulled upwards. Her fingers lingered in her husband's hands for a few seconds before she finally pulled away.

"Oh, I wish I were as lucky as you," Stan continued, pinning the white-haired girl to his side as he looked down at the man. "All the sacrifices she's about to make—they're for you! Don't let her actions be in vain!"

Bijou whimpered as she lowered her head, expecting Monster to flash them out of the dungeon. She couldn't face the humiliation of seeing her husband anymore. It was far too embarrassing. Instead, however, Stanley took his time in turning around, walking ever-so-slowly out the dungeon door.

"Bijou!"

The girl winced as she heard her husband's voice. She looked over her shoulder as he jerked forward, only to be snapped back to the walls when the chains reached their limits.

"Can't we please dash out of here?" Bijou pressed.

"You hate it when I use my speed," Stan reminded. "I thought it'd be best not to use it at a time like this."

"BIJOU!"

"No, I think right now's a really good time!" Bijou begged with yet another glance at her husband's retreating form.

"Ahh, _Cherie_, when you gain your own vampire speed, you'll be free to use it whenever you'd like. Right now, I think you should revel your human lifestyle," he said as he tugged her forward.

"…_Bijou_…" her husband breathed, suddenly out of breath after not having used so much energy in so long.

"I hate you," Bijou cried as her face lowered again. "I hate you more than I ever thought hating anything was possible!"

That's when the first little shadow creature crawled out of the dungeon's dark pits, a little snake-like fly that buzzed unnoticed among the cracks of the ceilings.

"That's not the disposition you want to have of me right now. Think…_intimately_…for the moment," Stan almost sang with happiness.

_Intimacy?_ Bijou's mind spat. _One day, I'll show you how deeply my hatred runs and I'll kill you myself!_

"The night will only be more difficult for you with all that hatred brewing," Stan reminded as they reached the gates to the dungeon.

"I recommend relaxing and letting yourself become at ease. I guarantee no human could ever take you where I can," Stan explained as the gate rose up.

Bijou's eyes widened as Stan clutched Bijou even more tightly to his side, almost smiling at the girl's puffy red eyes. He then looked towards the gate as it rose, casting the two of them in a glow of firelight.

-

-

With a gasp, Bijou's eyes shot open the next morning.

Quickly, she sat up and looked around, pressing the black silk sheets against her skin. Her head was in so much pain. Stan, thankfully, was nowhere to be seen.

She brought her knees up to herself and buried her face into them, crying as she thought of her previous night, and her husband.

…_wait_…

Bijou's eyes immediately turned to her right. Sure enough, there was a tray of food—some eggs, a plate of diced up fruits and a branch of grapes, juice and milk—all arranged for her.

Bijou looked around the bed as fast as she could. Her red gown from yesterday was gone and in its place there was an off-white gown with light pink ribbons running through its corset.

After rushing to get dressed, Bijou jumped off the bed, gathering as much food in her hands as she could. However, a pain in her neck caused her to drop a grapefruit she'd been holding.

Bijou winced as she placed her hand over her neck, feeling the two scars that were left behind after Stan had bitten her last night.

Deciding not to dwell on it for too long, Bijou ran out of the room, surprised that no guards were there to stop her from leaving.

He may have bitten her during his passion, and with that, taken some of her blood, but he hadn't tried to turn her, and for that, Bijou reminded herself as she ran down the dark corridors as quickly as she could, she had to be thankful.

She was a whirl of white as she finally got to the nautilus-shaped staircase and ran down the steps, not caring how fast she was running and that she could fall to her death down these three-hundred steps. At least she was barefoot which gave her some more control over her footwork.

Bijou almost looked mad with the speed she took, but the girl couldn't care less. As she, out of breath, reached the gate to the dungeon, she was once again surprised that there were no guards.

She paused as she realized the gate was risen, whereas yesterday, it was bolted shut with two guards on either side of it.

And regardless of where Stan was in the castle, she was positive he would've tried his best, and most likely succeeded given his speed, at stopping her.

Bijou ignored the rotten smell as she tentatively made her way inside, cautiously eyeing every nook and cranny she passed as she held the food up to her chest. Every sound she heard, be it the dripping of water or a small rat nibbling a stale piece of bread in the corner, caused her to spin around, fearing Stan's arrival at any moment.

Finally, she reached the area where he was yesterday. However…

Bijou panicked as she realized the chains attached to the wall were empty. Where was he?! She could feel anxiety rising all throughout her figure, her every thought leading to the worst case scenario.

She dropped her food and grabbed the sides of her head, falling to her knees as her mind was spinning.

"No, no, no, no, nooo!!!" Bijou cried as her fingers entangled themselves into her white locks. Could Monster have gotten rid of him over the night—just when she finally agreed to do everything he wanted?! No, no, no! Nobody could be _that_ cruel!

A black flying salamander, no bigger than Bijou's hands, appeared and started flying around the circumference of the dungeon's ceilings, but Bijou did not notice.

She sobbed for what was really a few seconds, but for her time seemed to drag on for years in that incredibly short period. She could feel all her hope and desires vanish as she cried.

Suddenly, she felt two _warm_ hands wrap protectively around her shoulders.

Bijou paused and looked up, her eyes shaking as she—almost in a dream-like trance—glanced up and was faced with his blue eyes.

"Hey," he said, smiling and looking more healthy than ever. His face wasn't pale…his eyes weren't sunken in. His dirty clothes had been replaced with a clean shirt and pants. He looked amazing, perfect, _normal_!

And he was standing, or well kneeling at the moment, right in front of her!

Bijou grabbed onto him as he held her up and cried as he hugged her. She had never felt so relieved in her life.

"I was so worried," she sobbed, clutching the fabric of the back of his shirt. "I was _so scared_." She kept crying, wondering if she was going to wake up any minute from this dream.

"Heh…They gave me a spa treatment last night. A bath, clean clothes, they brought a bed in here, too, so I could rest peacefully," his head jerked forward in the direction of a mattress laying at the far end of the dungeon, though Bijou didn't care to look up as she continued crying into his chest.

"And food?" Bijou asked timidly, finally looking up. "They gave you food, right?"

He looked to the side, letting out a deep breath as he admitted. "They did…"

"Then what's wrong?!" Bijou exclaimed as she clutched his shirt tighter. "You're alive!"

"They…they made sure I ate every bite. I didn't want to eat any, but they practically forced the food down my throat…" He looked down at the girl, remembering painfully what she had to sacrifice for him to be fed.

Bijou's mind wondered for a second about why they would force him to eat. Surely if he refused, these monsters wouldn't care if he survived…

But she shook her head, not liking where her thoughts were going.

"It doesn't matter, as long as you're alive! It's a miracle that you look so healthy!"

Her husband looked surprised for a second, but then smiled as he nuzzled his face into her hair.

"You're right. I've missed you so much, Bijou."

-

-

"And then when I woke up, I was in here," he explained as the two of them sat on the little mattress.

"I'm sorry," Bijou shook her head and her face fell into her hands.

"He's obsessed with me—that's the only reason you were brought into this! He thinks I'm his mate, and…and he plans on turning me into a vampire!" she explained as she looked up.

Her husband paused as he looked to the side. "Heh. I always knew you were too good for me and someone would try and take you from me."

"I've missed you," Bijou explained, grabbing his hand and bringing it up to her lips. "There hasn't been a day I haven't thought about you and our life!"

"I was so worried," her husband explained as he scooted closer to her on the bed. "We all were—Pashmina, Boss, Oxy! We filed police reports, even got the FBI involved! You just disappeared…!"

He placed his forehead against hers and put his fingers gently against the side of her neck. Bijou enjoyed this affection, relishing every second she had with him. She closed her eyes and let him explore her after so long until his fingers brushed across the two scabs.

"What's this?" he asked as he saw the two perfectly aligned bite marks on her neck. They had previously been covered by her hair, but as he moved her white locks away, he saw the pink area around her skin where _he_ bit her.

Bijou looked to the side and bit her lip, ashamed.

Her husband lowered his head. She could no longer see his blue eyes hidden beneath his orange-and-white bangs.

"Did he hurt you?" he asked in a low voice. The question didn't need an answer. How many people could say having fangs dug into their skin was a pleasant experience?

Bijou hugged herself as she shook her head. "I'm a little dizzy, but I'm fine." She couldn't look her husband in the eyes.

"I'll kill him," her husband hissed. Bijou looked at him and saw his fists, white in his clenched fury.

"You can't," she explained, her own fists clenching. "He's fast and strong and can come behind you without you ever knowing…! We stand no chance against him, and he has a sister, too!"

"I know," he said. "The two of them were the ones that visited me the first day I woke up in here. And it may take some time, but we can figure out a way to take them out!"

"I'm not so sure about that! I mean…I never thought these things existed," Bijou explained as her shoulders slumped. "These monsters were just things of movie and television! How can they be real, and how can you defeat a monster that's not supposed to be real?!"

The two of them simultaneously hung their heads.

"Sometimes I think I'm in a nightmare and haven't woken up," they both said at the same time.

The two of them looked at each other. They were always on the same wavelength, even after this separation. It was like something invisible always linked them, and they wholeheartedly trusted the unseen.

"You look beautiful," he said as he turned to her, instinctively moving closer to her.

Bijou beamed. "You told me so yesterday."

"It doesn't mean it's any less true," he reminded. The two of them leaned forward, inching closer and closer.

"You don't think these Renaissance clothes are ridiculous?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

"You look good in everything," he reminded, his voice just as soft.

The tension was building within and between them. They needed release.

He cupped her face and kissed her, and she returned it with every ounce of vigor she had. And as they leaned back on the bed, for a couple of short, sweet hours, they risked everything to forget where they were and who they were.

-

-

The two of them looked at the dungeon gate, taking a few steps out of it, only to step back in, despite there being a clear path for them to make a run for it.

"It's a trap," Bijou tried to massage her temples, turning away from the nautilus staircase. "Like when I came here, there were no guards, and Stan didn't come and stop me. Something's wrong!"

"And we're so beneath the surface, too," her husband agreed as they walked through the rancid prison. "Maybe if we could get to the top really fast…?"

"That won't work, either," she reminded him. "He's incredibly fast. I wish more than anything I could have his speed! It would save me so much trouble," she exclaimed, remembering her few suicide attempts that were decimated because of his speed (as well as his ability to focus on her emotions).

"He'll never let me leave. I have a feeling that if, by some miracle, we manage to make it to the rest of the world, he'll track us down again and bring me back!"

"Well what are the classic ways to kill a vampire?" her husband asked. "We can't use sunlight since there is so little sunlight here."

"Not to mention he has to be in the sun for a few hours to actually die. He told me so himself." Bijou paced around the dungeon as her husband sat on a wooden box.

"What about the humans that work for him?" he pressed, looking up excitedly.

Bijou shook her head. "They're far too loyal to him, not to mention, I don't know what he'd do to them if they helped us." She remembered what happened to the two maids that neglected to tell him she was married. She couldn't handle any more innocent lives being taken away on her account.

Her husband looked depressed for a moment, only to raise his head with something Bijou never thought about.

"What about a cross? Don't vampires hate religious emblems?"

"That's perfect!" Bijou cried. Her husband stood up and Bijou rushed to him.

"But I haven't seen any crosses around since I've been here," she said quietly, thinking as she put a finger on her lips.

"That probably means we're onto something," her husband said as Bijou nodded. She dwelled some more on the subject. A cross…perhaps she could make a wooden one…

"How about a stea—what's wrong?"

Her husband suddenly had on a strange expression. His face was scrunched up, his eyes winced tight, tearing in the corners. One of his hands suddenly wrapped around his stomach as he leaned forward, almost doubling-over in pain.

"Ok, ok!" Bijou said quickly as she grabbed him, putting one of his arms around her shoulders. She walked him over to the bed and laid him down.

His head arched back as the rest of his body broke out in a sweat. Bijou watched this entire scene unfold in less than two minutes, one of her hands pressing her husband's burning forehead and the other over her mouth.

"What on earth…?" she gasped. He had just been completely ok a few minutes ago! What could've done this?!

Bijou glanced from her husband's ill form to the dungeon gate. Perhaps she should get some help, a maid or a guard… maybe he was just experiencing a fever as an adverse effect of having been in this dungeon for over three weeks? It didn't matter what it was, he needed some medical attention!

But if she left him, could she be sure he'd be there when she returned? She couldn't trust anything in this place. She lifted his wrist and tried to feel his pulse. It was fast, but incredibly faint.

Bijou leaned over his chest carefully, placing her ear above his heart and realizing with horror how undetectable this pulse was as well.

_No fever does this_, Bijou thought, panicking. His whole face was flushed, and despite the beads of sweat matting his entire visage, his body was getting colder. He was starting to shiver.

"Ahh, so it's finally starting to take its effect…"

Bijou looked up, her mouth falling open. She didn't turn around, but she didn't need to anyway as she felt the room get colder and colder. Behind her, she heard his footsteps as he approached, every step resounding like the beat of a drum.

Two more slithering creatures started darting around the ceiling of the underground prison.

"It took long enough," Stan mused, standing right beside the bed and looking down at the sick man.

Bijou turned her head. Her eyes were mad with rage, her hair flying like white threads as she glared.

"What took long enough?!" she screamed as she stepped off the bed, coming face-to-face with Monster.

"The poison that was in his food. I knew it took some time to react with the acids in his stomach, but I had to wait nearly the entire day for this!" he complained, shaking his head sadly. "What a shame…I almost thought I hadn't given him enough."

Bijou's world broke. Everything around her shattered, and the ringing was so loud it drowned out her thoughts. She could feel her heart erupt in pain; for a few seconds she feared it would break in half. She couldn't even hear herself as she spoke.

"P…P-p-_poison_?!" Bijou cried, grabbing her head once again as she turned around. She watched her husband's body twitch. He groaned with pain.

She immediately went back to the bed, grabbing her husband's arm tightly, as if the harder she squeezed, the more he'd be healed.

"Oh, that won't do any good, _Cherie_," Stan continued. "Once it takes its effect, you're as good as dead."

Her own eyes started twitching with the stress.

"An…an…antidote!" Bijou turned to Stan. "I'll do what you want—anything! Give me the antidote!"

Stan shrugged, his apathetic face never changing. "There isn't one, _Cherie_."

Bijou stared at him in disbelief for a moment, until her husband's coughing brought her back. She watched as he jerked forward, blood erupting from his mouth as his head continued tilting backwards.

"One, or two minutes, maybe," Stan thought aloud. "Or perhaps that's an overestimation…"

Bijou ripped off a piece of her white gown, bundling it into a ball and wiping his face with it, her own tears soaking his face. But every time the white fabric was stained with blood, more and more coughs led to a dirtier piece of cloth.

A bat-like creature, made entirely of negativity and hopelessness, now appeared and started whirring about. Stan was the only one in the room that noticed, his lime-green eyes curious about the strange, depressing aura the bat was giving off.

As his eyes went back to Bijou's despairing form as she tried her best to hide her own anxiousness while treating her husband, Stan had to wonder, his eyes going back to the bat and now noticing the other tiny creatures flying around the ceiling, if these flying beasts were…

"Please don't die," Bijou pleaded. She wasn't sure if he could understand her in his current condition, but she had to find a way to get through to him.

After his latest blood spasm, his breathing was shallow and his eyes were still shut. He took one last, abrupt, breath as another shiver ran down his body.

"_No, you can't leave me," _she gasped as her head fell onto his chest, her white hair also getting darkened by the blood but she couldn't care less.

"_Please_," she begged. "_**Please!!**_"

His chest was barely rising. His breathing could stop any minute. However, the girl felt his hand squeeze hers in return.

She looked up and noticed his eyes were barely open. His barely-visible irises shook slightly.

Bijou got off of him and scrambled to his side, lifting his head into her lap, willing him to open his eyes and look at her.

"I love you," he said softly. Even though he was looking right at her, his eyes were unfocused. Could he even see at this point?

"I love you, too," she replied. Her fingers shook as they gently combed through his hair. Stan had to give her credit for keeping her composure as still as she did during these moments, but these critters that were flying around the ceiling were starting to raise his own anxiety levels.

"But that's why you can't die," Bijou added. Her lips were trembling. More and more pieces of her world were falling apart every second.

If there was a God, how could He let this happen?

"No…choice," the man shivered in her lap. He smiled. "I wonder…what's next…?"

Bijou's tears fell like a faucet on full blast. "You're a good person. There's only Heaven for you, and I'll meet you there soon enough, but _not now_. You can't go now!!!" she cried, fighting back her sobs. Her voice was so tight with tension, it swirled around Stan like a fragile but dangerous vortex.

"Cheh. No you won't," Stan reminded, though he started getting nervous with all this emotion filling the room.

Something he had failed to tell her was what her negative emotions, at this level, could _physically_ harm him. The physical responses he felt to her emotions were how he was positive she was his mate.

"That sounds nice," the dying man finally spoke, closing his eyes in satisfaction as he took in the light that Bijou and Stan could not see. "Goodbye, Bijou."

"_NOOO!!!" _Bijou screamed as both her hands clasped over her mouth. She could feel the heat leaving from his body with every passing second.

She could not believe it for the first minute. It had all happened so fast, she was left petrified staring at his now-lifeless form.

Another shadow—this time, a massive one the size of Stan—emerged from the corners of the ceiling. It started darting across the room.

"_No, no no no no no no no noooooooooooooo!!!" _she fell to the side, her head just kept spinning.

Her world was fading. She grabbed her hair maddeningly, tugging at it so hard she probably would've pulled it out eventually.

She saw the faces of her friends, her parents, her husband, fading away into a light, and all she could see were two dark hands pulls her deeper and deeper into an abyss. That string of tension broke, and all around the dungeon her depression and agony and hopelessness dashed like dark harpies across the room, something only Stan was aware of as he nervously looked up at the physical manifestations of her mourning.

Her husband was still lying supine, his corpse so peaceful and delicate. Nothing could hurt him anymore.

Everything shattered. As she continued staring longingly at his lifeless body, all she could hear were her own gasps of choked breath and the buzzing that came with the blood pressure.

Her world broke and spun at the same time. The dizzier she got from seeing all these images crash in front of her, the more she saw nothing but black. All the light was gone. There was nothing left. Maybe nothing could touch her precious husband anymore, but that meant nothing was left for her in return. Everything worth living for had been taken and stolen and removed from her life.

Stan looked up and saw a massive, shadowy silhouette flying above his head. It was a pterodactyl with a wingspan of at least twenty feet. Though Bijou herself could not see these monsters swarming around the room, Stan knew exactly which feeling this was.

Her heart, something humans didn't even realize was a feeling in and of itself.

One little bat, one of Bijou's feelings, nicked Stan in the ear as it passed. He grimaced as he stared up at the vortex of flying monsters.

"_Cherie_," he called out, looking apprehensively at the ceiling.

But Bijou could not hear him, just like she could not see the creatures that were currently bringing Stan fear. She just continued staring at her husband's beautiful body and she had to keep reminding herself that nothing could hurt him anymore. Nothing. _Nothing._

That's what her life was now, nothing. There was no reason for her to wake up tomorrow morning. She had no desire to keep on living this pitiful life if she had no hope of breaking free. And even if she did have a chance to leave, a world without _him_ wasn't one she wanted to face.

Wasn't it possible to die from blood pressure alone? Yes, hadn't she read somewhere that someone once had a brain hemorrhage because of the stress? Could she do that to herself right now?

She clutched her heart as she sobbed. Everything was now broken, including the muscle that kept beating. All she wanted was for it to stop and let her move onwards. The shards of her life fell to her feet all around her. There was nowhere for her mental state to go unless she wanted to cut her feet open on the shards' mercilessly cold edges.

If there was a God, surely He wouldn't punish us for this! Why? She had done nothing wrong, she had no skeletons in her closet! She was an overall good girl—why, why, WHY?!

Stan ducked as the black pterodactyl, the massive creature formed from Bijou's despair, flew dangerously close over his head, barely a few inches above his strawberry-blond mane. Still on his knees, he reached out to his aching mate.

"Bijou," he said softly, trying as much as possible not to distress her anymore.

Bijou's breathing came out in choked coughs, as if she herself were dying. She was internally praying that some supernatural force would come down and sweep her away from this place, either dead or alive. She didn't care, she could no longer live like this; everything worth hoping for had been smashed and demolished. Nothing was left, no hope.

Some of her white bangs fell into her face, blocking more of her vision which was already skewed with tears. When she felt his icy hand in her hair, she found her breathing to stop for a few seconds.

"You have to calm down now, Bijou," he explained. It wasn't because he cared about her well-being. It was because he was afraid of her feelings getting more and more violent.

Bijou shifted, her mouth open in confusion as she, kneeling on her elbows for support, looked at the vampire.

"What…did you call me?" she asked. She looked like a child, so innocent, questioning her parent.

Stan sighed. He didn't look up, but he could tell the emotions flying around the room had slowed down. Her fury and depression were momentarily suspended.

"_Cherie-_" he started in an appeasing tone.

"That's not what you called me," Bijou breathed as she looked down, her bangs covering her eyes as her fists clenched.

"You called me 'Bijou'!" When she lifted her face, her eyes were widened, but her pupils were small. She looked completely mad.

The monsters flew faster and faster, a speed that caused them to look like black blurs against the dungeon ceiling.

"You never call me that—it's always '_Cherie_'!" she spat, crawling towards Stan on all fours.

"So tell me, _Master Stanley_," she giggled, completely losing it, as she clutched the front of his shirt, "If I am so dear to you, why did you do this to me?"

She was smiling as she looked up at him, but as Stan did nothing but stare down at her, her smile started to break as her grip on his shirt tightened. Her breathing became controlled gasps, and the monsters flew so fast they created a sharp draft in the dungeon.

"I did everything—_.thing.—_you asked me to do! I did it so that _he_ would survive. You promised me you'd keep him alive!"

"_Cherie_, I promised I would give him food. I never promised his life," Stan whispered.

Bijou was shocked. The monsters kept increasing their speed, something Bijou couldn't see despite her hair flying in the wind of their vortex.

"A loophole? You found yourself a loophole!" she gripped his shirt tighter.

"I warned you…I warned you that if something happened to him, I'd have no will to continue my life," she pounded at his chest, but he didn't flinch as her fists banged into him.

After all she had sacrificed, after she has basically prostituted herself to him, he could actually be this cruel. Bijou was always told there was some good in everyone, but this pathetic creature was nothing but the destruction he caused. There was nothing redeeming about him.

"I hate you," she cried, her fists hitting him faster and faster. But his stone-like skin did never flinched. "_I hate you, I hate YOU, I HATE YOU! __**I HATE YOU, I HATE YOU SO MUCH!!!!**_"

There were now two pterodactyls and they flew above Stan's hand like a pendulum, coming closer and closer with every swing.

When she realized her attacks would have no effect, she started clawing at his face, but that didn't do anything to him as he lifted his eyes upward. Stan saw the pterodactyls hover dangerously close to Bijou, just inches from the top of her hair, but their blood-red eyes were focused on him and him alone. They would never hurt their master.

"Do you know what this _means_?" she asked in her madness, smiling once again despite the continuous tears. She leaned forward, and he fell on his back willingly, if only to increase the distance between his body and the growing proximity of the monsters.

"This means that when you turn me, when your disgusting, putrid self tries to make me into a vampire _just like you_," her voice came out uncharacteristically high, like a broken violin string as her nails futilely dug into his cheek.

"I'll die!" she cried excitedly. "I'll die! Die, die, _die_, _die_, _**die**_!" she cheered.

"You may think you have won, but you just guaranteed failure when you turn me! And I can't _wait_ for that day! In fact—why don't you try turning me right now? You bit me last night, right? Don't you wanna try it again?" she nodded frantically, moving some of her hair off her neck.

When Stan did nothing but continue to look up at the ceiling, Bijou blinked several times.

"You're not shy, are you? That's so funny—and so not like the _Master Stanley_ I saw last night! Come on, bite me! Suck all the blood out of me! Try turning me! It'll be fun! Do _anything_!!! _Come on_!"

"_No_?" Bijou asked, tears falling from her eyes when Stan didn't reply or move. "Cat got your tongue?"

"Then maybe I can try killing myself!" she got off of Stan and walked over to a small stone brick lying in one corner of the revolting prison.

Stan knew what she was attempting, and just as he sat up and tried to move, one of the pterodactyls came lunging at him with the speed of a missile, causing him to duck back down, covering his face with his hands.

"…!" He lay on his back and watched with horror as both monsters flew over him, literally an inch over his chest. Their whip-like tails scraped his face as they passed, actually drawing a thin line of dead blood from cheek to cheek, causing the vampire to remain petrified.

"**STAY AWAY FROM ME**!" Bijou warned. She was unwittingly controlling these beasts as she gripped the brick in her hand. If she hit her temples hard enough, then surely her life would end! And Stan was pinned to the ground, she didn't care why or how he wasn't trying to stop her.

She took the brick and positioned her arms properly. Without a second thought, her hand came swinging down, and just as that happened, all the little bats and harpies that Bijou's feelings had formed started darting at Stan, both pterodactyls revealing their pincer-like teeth as they dived face-first at him.

But just as both beings in the room gripped themselves for their deaths, Bijou fell face forward before the brick ever contacted her body, and the monsters disappeared a split-second before they would've ripped his dead heart out of his body.

"What the—" Stan's eyes remained widened. There was nothing left of the creatures, not a single trace of them! Could Bijou have actually…?

He immediately sat up, turning to where Bijou was. She was collapsed on the ground, the brick laying just a few inches from her fainted arm. She couldn't be…

"I pressed the pressure point on her lower jaw," Sandy explained as she stared at her nails, though internally she was shaking. She'd _never_ let Stan know that, though.

"Did you see them?" Stan asked, amazed at what he had just experienced.

Sandy breathed out like a bull as she glared at Stan. "I saw a vague outline of whatever was attacking you. I imagine you saw it much more clearly."

Stan sighed in relief as he stared at Bijou's fallen body.

"I've warned you that as her mate, you have to make sure her mental and physical health are your top priorities. Perhaps you finally see why that is."

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_We cannot separate, 'cause you're part of me  
And though you're invisible, I'll trust the unseen_

-Barlow Girl, _Never Alone_

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	3. Part III: The Vivisection

SO sorry for the hesitation in updates. The truth is, I really don't want to neglect _Petals_, so since this is already finished, I tend to forget to update this or at least wait until the next chapter of _Petals_ is done. But the new chapter of my other fic is being a little stubborn and isn't coming out the way I want, so in the mean time I decided to just update this. This is the second to last chapter!

**AmyAddict1-**Thank you for your review! Isn't Stan the worst? Ahh, hopefully Bijou's smart enough to not give in. Hopefully...

**Anditends-**Glad you liked the dinosaurs. I wish I could tell you what inspired those, but I honestly have no idea. While I was writing that scene, if I remember correctly, I just thought, "I know! I'll have him be attacked by black pterodactyls! Chhyyeahhh!" I don't know where I come up with half this stuff. Thanks for reviewing!

**Crystalgurl101-**You cried? I think I'll take that as a compliment, or a sign that my writing can evoke emotions! Truth be told, writing the last chapter made me depressed for a while, so I can completely understand. I'm really glad you liked "Never Alone" as well. I'm beginning to think that song was what inspired this fic, but I can't be sure. Anyway, thank you so much for reviewing and reading!

**Laidbackguy-**Not sure why, but I lol'ed at your review. Thanks for the compliments and thank you for reviewing!

**Point237-**A piece of literature? I'm quite honored, because I don't think my work has ever been called literature, but thank you so much for your review! It's nice to know that I make people put down what they're doing to read my work, it really is a satisfying feeling.

**x00-**You're welcome for the update! And thank you for the review!

I'm taking a deep breath as I post this, only because I know what you're about to read. Thank you for staying with this fic so far, and hopefully, you'll feel...something...about this chapter. Good or bad, I can't predict that at this point.

**CN**

**Les Nuages de la Perdition**

**Part III: **_The Vivisection_

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"This was his name, and these are the dates of his birth and…" Bijou trailed off as she held the small piece of stationary up to Sandy. She couldn't finish the sentence, not only because it was still too fresh in her mind, but because she wasn't even sure about the death date. She could be off, give or take a couple of days since she had lost track of time ever since she arrived.

"What would you like me to do with these?" Sandy asked quietly, taking the small piece of paper and watching as Bijou walked over to her bed, gripping one of the four posters for support.

"I don't know if you've done anything with his body yet," Bijou said quietly as a single tear fell down her face, "It's already been two days…but please, give him a proper burial. Let his body rest in peace, _please_."

Sandy looked down. "It shall be done."

Bijou sat down on her bed, her head bowing as she looked at the fabric of her plum-colored gown. She hadn't seen Stan in the past two days, and she prayed that the monster would let her live out the rest of her life in peace. A small piece of her actually thought that maybe he'd let her go, as surely he couldn't attempt to turn her anymore. But here she was, as trapped as ever.

"How could you…let him do this?" Bijou asked quietly, still looking down.

"I didn't agree with the poisoning," Sandy said softly.

"But you knew about it?" the white-haired girl asked as she looked at the vampire. Sandy didn't answer, but she did walk around the bed.

"Eventually, Stan would've needed to eliminate him. You _are_ his mate. You were never meant for a human," she explained.

Bijou looked away, disgusted with the vampire female.

"Even so, you didn't have to kill him." Bijou shut her eyes, trying to fight back her emotions as the memories kept haunting her. "There was no point in bringing him here."

Sandy suddenly felt something akin to empathy spark within her at the Bijou's words, something she was not expecting in the slightest. Nevertheless, she pretended like Bijou's words never reached her.

"You have more power than you know," She continued. "Even as a human, you probably would've killed my brother."

Bijou had no idea what Sandy was talking about, nor did she care about 'what if's'. The horrid fact was, Monster was still very much alive, or undead, or whatever his filthy existence was, and her husband was gone.

"You're going to make an incredibly powerful vampire," Sandy thought aloud.

At this, Bijou turned her head and glared at the girl.

"You should realize that I will never become a vampire at this point," she snapped.

Sandy smiled, albeit softly. "Time heals all wounds."

"Get _out_."

Sandy did a small curtsy as she turned around and walked out of the room, leaving Bijou all to her lonesome, which is exactly what the girl wanted.

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When Sandy left Bijou's room, she leaned against the girl's chamber door, feeling a strange sensation in her undead chest. She placed a pale hand over her left clavicle, her lime-green eyes shaking.

Bijou's eyes looked so defeated and so lifeless, and yet Sandy could not help but think that she had seen such a look of despair in her own eyes before.

But why?

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Bijou sat at her desk, looking at the pad of stationary and the pens (one of the very few things recognizable from the current millennium) that lay before her.

She picked up one of the pens and drew three tally marks on the paper. Today was the start of the third day since…_the dungeon_. She ripped off the piece of paper with the tally marks and placed it upright against an empty picture frame that was on the desk.

She stared at the fresh piece of stationary in front of her. Idly, she took her pen and started sketching something onto the paper. She wasn't even sure what she was drawing, she just kept at it.

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When the maids entered the room with Bijou's lunch, they noticed that the desk was covered in pieces of paper. When they approached the desk, they noticed that the papers had very beautiful drawings on them, mostly of flowers and little birds, but they were quite good.

"Where is she?" one of the maids asked the other. Bijou wasn't anywhere in the bedroom, so they, cautiously, walked to the bathroom. As they opened the door, they gasped.

Bijou was on her knees. The cabinets of the bathroom had been rummaged through, and the contents were thrown all about the floor. She had apparently been looking for something; that something was currently in her hands.

The bathroom was normally stocked with makeup and beauty supplies from all over the world, and Bijou had found a piece of charcoal eyeliner used in South East Asia. Except, she wasn't using it for her eyes. Her pale hands were smudged with black as she continued to draw all over the bathroom floor, her eyes focused and never moving.

She didn't look up at the maids as she finished up the last bits of her drawing. The charcoal stick was originally seven inches long, and now it was nothing but a small pebble in her hands as she signed her name, a script Bijou, along the corner.

"It's beautiful," one of the maids commented. She had drawn a garden, much like the one here in the palace, that looked brilliant. She had put such detail and care into every part, the fountain, the flowers, the trees, everything!

"Aren't you going to finish signing it?" the other maid asked as Bijou shrugged her shoulders. "Most artists use their full names, or at least use the first letter of their last name. Aren't you going to put an 'H' there?"

"It's just Bijou now," Bijou said as she wiped her hands, though that didn't do much except smudge them all the more. Her face also had black spots all over it, as did the grass green gown she was wearing.

"Just Bijou?" the other maid asked.

Bijou stood up, simply looking down at the garden she just drew with an emotion she had no name for. No one would understand how she couldn't bring herself to be associated with her husband's name anymore. She was, in every way, the cause of his death, and she felt ashamed to be associated with him for that very reason. She didn't deserve it.

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Bijou continued to keep track of the days with tally marks. She also used everything—ink, pens, pencils, blush, etc.—that she could find as an art medium. This was something her maids noted quietly as they served her her meals. They never asked her why she did what she did…they just knew it brought her some form of consolation.

If Bijou were to be totally honest with herself, she didn't know why she kept drawing. All she knew was that idle hands were the devil's play things, and so she reached out to any outlet she could. She had taken a couple of art classes in college, and figured she would put her tuition to good use. Steadily, she could see her own art improving, which was to be expected when one spent over fifteen hours a day drawing and sketching and painting.

When she woke up on the seventh day, she saw an easel by the window. As the maids set up her breakfast tray on the bedside table, Bijou got out of bed and stared at the easel.

"What's this?" she asked the maids, touching the mahogany piece of wood. She looked behind her easel and at her desk. Her eyes widened.

On her desk, there were boxes upon boxes of watercolors, oil paints, pastels, colored pencils, paintbrushes in every size, charcoal pencils, reams of easel paper, acrylic paints, inks in colors Bijou didn't even know inks came in, markers and palettes of all different sizes.

To say that she was impressed was an understatement, until the maid answered her.

"We were told that you might enjoy some supplies for your..err…hobby," she said quietly. Bijou frowned.

"By whom?" she asked both maids. In response, the two of them looked at each other quickly before they smiled.

"If it's from your Master—," Bijou stopped herself, scowling as she turned back to the art supplies. It didn't sit well with her at all that these maids were reporting her activities to Stan, and she certainly had no interest in him bribing her. However, he had just provided her with weeks of things to keep herself occupied. She needed this. She couldn't keep thinking back to…

Bijou cringed. "You're dismissed," she said, voice barely above a whisper. As they left, Bijou walked over to the easel and traced her fingers across the smooth, white paper.

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The maids would pretend like they were absorbed in dusting Bijou's room, all the while clenching their fists, as they would hear the girl sob as she sat at her easel.

Too often, they'd hear Bijou rip off the paper to her easel, yet another painting destroyed due to the water of her tears.

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Sandy had closed all the curtains in her room; she had warned the maids not to bother her. She had trapped herself in her chamber for nearly three days at this point, and yet despite all the peace and quiet surrounding her, she could not sleep.

"_Ahh, look at him, Sandy," Stan smirked as he stared across the dungeon at Bijou's husband, watching the man with his hands still tied behind his back as food was practically shoved down his throat._

"_Be sure he eats it all," Stan reminded the servants that were feeding him as Bijou's husband squirmed away from the food._

"_It's curious: He has not eaten in days yet he is refusing the food," Sandy said, not too involved as she crossed her hands across her chest._

_The imprisoned man glared at the two vampires, his blue eyes narrowed slits as one muscular man behind him squeezed his mouth open and another maid in front of him shoved foul-tasting meat into his mouth._

"_Well that's because he's still upset about me having Bijou tonight," Stan smiled. Sandy looked at her brother through the corner of her eye._

"_And where is Bijou right now?"_

"_In my chamber, resting. The poor human nearly fainted afterward, so I thought it'd be best to let her sleep through the nigh—O, but her blood truly is the sweetest thing I have ever tasted!" the strawberry-blond added as he put a hand over his chin, his thoughts lost on how wonderful his and Bijou's physical love life would be once she was a vampire. _

_Sandy resisted rolling her eyes. She ignored her brother for the most part, but noticed something._

"_Stanley _what_ is that smell? I am positive it's not the normal amount of decay in this dungeon," she explained, snorting out the smell from her nose._

"_Ahh, well that," Stan added as an evil smirk came across his features, distressing the imprisoned man and Sandy to a slight degree, "is the poison in his food." He spoke with the lowest of frequencies, one only supernatural creatures could detect._

_Sandy's mouth fell. Inside her, her stomach turned nervously like she was watching an accident unravel before her very eyes but there was nothing she could do._

_The worst part was, Sandy felt like this had all happened before._

"_Stanley…you didn't…" she said as she took a step back, but Stan was the one that looked bored now._

"_Well you couldn't actually expect me to release him into normal society. He'd gather some sort of army and come after his wife, and me, of course."_

_Sandy's eyes shook. She would've burst into tears at his brother's cruelty if she was still human, but for now all she could do was hang her head low._

"_Bijou will be crushed. Nothing shatters a girl more than the loss of a great love," Sandy said, almost automatically as she shut her eyes tight._

_Stan did not look amused. "What's gotten into you, Sandy?" he asked a little angrily._

_Sandy bit her lip and did her best to clear her mind. Stanley was right: she was not acting normal. She had a shell that had inadvertently formed when she became a vampire, so why in this particular moment did she suddenly feel like falling apart?_

"_Nothing," Sandy said, looking up at Stan with those dull, hollow eyes. _

"_Perhaps you should rest as well," Stanley added, offering his twin his elbow. "Mmm…maybe give him a bath, and a bed, I think he would like that," Stan told his servants as Sandy latched onto him._

She saw Bijou hysterical at the sight of her husband's death, and she had no choice but to end it and knock Bijou out because Sandy could not handle it.

It seemed since that day, Bijou's dead eyes were haunting her more and more with the passing of time, and now, no matter how tired or blood-deprived, the girl could not get any sleep.

She wondered if Bijou was faring better than she.

_Of course not_, her sarcastic inner voice scolded. _A girl cannot overcome such a tragedy so quickly_. What a stupid thing to think.

She turned to her side and buried her pale face into her pillow.

"_Lady Sandy…you frequent the library quite often!"_

Sandy sat up, her body shivering at the memory over a century old that she believed to have forgotten…

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"I want to go to the library," Bijou declared one day, stepping back from the easel. There were twenty-seven tally marks on her little piece of paper.

The maid that was staying with her blinked. "The…library?"

Bijou folded her hands in front of her and smiled. "Yupp!"

The maid scratched the back of her head nervously. Master Stanley had given her no explicit orders to keep Bijou inside. On the contrary, he had told the maids, "Let her do as she pleases." But, adding to that, Stan had said, "I don't wish to see her, though." The problem was Stan spent a good part of his time in the library, and she didn't want to risk them running into each other.

"Is there a problem?" Bijou asked.

The maid looked to the side. Bijou was technically her Mistress…she wasn't free to disobey her. She took a deep breath and smiled a little too tightly. "Umm, no, not at all!"

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"Do you know where I can find books about exotic birds?" Bijou asked as she stepped into the grand library, followed by the two young maids behind her. She placed a finger to her lips as she looked around. There were probably close to a hundred thousand books in here…she could get lost for days with all this reading.

"Exotic birds, _Mademoiselle_?" one of the maids asked.

"Yes!" Bijou cried excitedly, spinning around as she smiled. The maids stared at her, perplexed. Just a few days ago this was the same girl sobbing as she slept and crying while she painted. And now, all of a sudden, she was smiling and talking happily.

But the color in her face was still gone…

"I painted robins, pigeons, doves, finches, and today I saw a quail on the window so I painted that," Bijou started to explain. "But now I want to paint a peacock, and I want a reference picture."

The maids blinked again. "Err…If I remember correctly, those books are at the top of the animal books' shelf. We'll go get them for you," the maid said.

The other maid nodded. "If you'll excuse us, Mistress Bijou!" she added as the two of them curtsied and scurried away.

Bijou watched them disappear into one of the many, many shelves that lined the library. When she was sure they were deep into the library, she quickly turned around and headed for a small corner of the room.

When Sandy had taken her to the library a few weeks ago, she had gotten a book on controlling emotions. However, at the same time she had found a book that could be of some use to her.

She darted through the aisles, her sunny yellow gown rustling with her quick movements. She glanced at all the books with professional speed and moved from one aisle to the next, still searching for that…

Bijou's eyes widened as she saw it, a large, ancient book that she had sandwiched between two dictionaries. The dictionaries were in a matching collection and had red covers, whereas this ancient text had a forest green covering to it, making it stand out.

She pulled it out, opening it to the page marked with a small red ribbon. Her eyes greedily took in the words, and she scanned the next few pages as quickly as she could, reading faster than she had ever read before.

Her eyes narrowed as the information sunk in further. So it was true…she theoretically could…

"Mistress Bijou!"

Bijou looked up and snapped the book closed just as both maids appeared around the far corner of the aisle.

"Mistress Bijou!" one of the maids said excitedly, clutching around five books to her chest, as they ran down the aisle. "We found some books with beautiful pictures of peacocks!"

Bijou tilted her head to the side and beamed. "How wonderful!"

"What were you reading?" the other girl asked as she nodded at the tome that the girl held in a vice grip.

"Ahh, this," Bijou said, her smiling growing wider, "is just a book I found on vampire history. It seemed interesting."

"Alright, Mistress Bijou! Is there anything else you need from here?" the maid held up one of the books to Bijou. Bijou took it, smiling all the while yet her eyes showing little interest, as she quickly flipped through the pages of bird sketches.

"No, no," she said softly, staring at plumage but far more interested in the book she had pressed against her heart. "I've gotten exactly what I need."

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Since that day at the library, Bijou started using the maids to her advantage, mostly convincing them to take her outside the room whenever she wasn't painting. She felt a little bad, as they always seemed to get flustered whenever she asked to go somewhere, but they ultimately obliged.

She had fifty-nine tally marks now.

Sometimes the maids would swear Bijou was trying to run into Stan, for she seemed to ask around midday (the time Stan would normally be up in the day) to leave, and she often asked to go to the places he frequented such as the garden or the library.

But little did they know, Bijou had no intention of ever seeing Stan again. She wanted fresh air, she wanted to keep herself occupied, she needed ways of forgetting, and the garden and library were the perfect outlets for that.

"Ok, little turtle, you need to stop moving," Bijou said, squatting on the stonework of the courtyard as she watched the small reptile crawl away. She had her sketchbook and a pencil in her hands and look sadly as the little green guy kept going away.

"I think he's moving slowly enough for you to draw him," one of the maids piped in from behind her. Bijou put a hand on her cheek and sighed.

"No, this little guy's too fast for me. I need more practice drawing action shots," she explained as she stood up. She looked at the two maids.

"Besides, you two look like you're freezing," she added. The fall months were ending, and while Bijou had been given a white, furry cape with her lavender gown, the maids were out in their simple black-and-white dresses.

"We're sorry you couldn't draw your turtle," one of the maids said in a congested voice.

"Ahh, well, that's ok," Bijou replied as her shoulders slumped, watching the turtle move further and further away from her.

She turned back to the maids and smiled. "I can draw him when I see him in the spring!"

Bijou walked past the maids and started heading back to the castle, but the maids stood there for a few seconds as they thought…

…In the spring?

This was the first time she had mentioned her future at the castle.

"Master Stanley will be pleased," one maid said to the other.

"Indeed. Perhaps she's finally starting to come around," the other replied, a warm feeling growing in her heart as she watched the white-haired beauty walk away. They had waited so long for their Master to find his one, true love…

.

.

In the middle of the night, hours after the maids would leave her, believing she was fast asleep, Bijou would pull out her two books. She'd sit in bed and read the one about emotions over and over again, and occasionally she'd meditate and focus on releasing her emotions. According to the book, once she became skilled enough to disguise her emotions, she could even master displaying fake emotions.

And then, just a few minutes before dawn, Bijou would read her other book, the one no one knew she had. She had read through it nearly a dozen times at this point, having memorized every word. It was written in an ancient dialect of French, but she still understood the gist of it well enough. But she had to _really want it_.

.

.

"Oh, you brought the flowers!" Bijou cried as she took the vase from the maid's arms, bringing it over to her desk where she often put whatever she wanted to paint.

The maid who had brought in the flowers went to the other maid, sitting on the seat at the end of Bijou's bed.

"Don't you think these flowers liven up the entire room?" Bijou asked as she started rearranging the bouquet, then angling the vase just right. She wanted the subject of her picture to be perfect.

"They…uhh…certainly add color!" the flower maid piped. Bijou turned and gave a small smile over her shoulder before returning to the flowers.

"In Japan, I took a few classes in ikebana. I hope they paid off. I want this picture to be flawless," Bijou added as she took her place behind her easel.

"Is there any reason in particular for that, Mistress?" the other maid asked. A part of her was hoping Bijou would answer, "The painting is for Stan!", but that response never came.

"I think I'm finally getting really good at painting flowery scenery. I want this to be my first official masterpiece!" Bijou said excitedly.

The maids' faces fell in disappoint, but Bijou paid them no mind as she peered over the easel and at the vase of flowers.

"Except…" Bijou patted her lips with her finger as she trailed off.

"Is something not to your liking, Mistress Bijou?" the maids quickly stood up as they realized something was amiss with the girl.

"I think," Bijou said at length, staring at the flowers, "That the bouquet needs some tiger lilies. If I asked for those, how long would they take to arrive?"

"We'll have them here by the evening!" the maids explained in unison, nodding their heads frantically.

"Do you want the pink-and-white kind?" the maid who originally brought in the flowers asked.

The white-haired girl looked down at her fuchsia gown and smoothed out one of its wrinkles. "The white kind…just plain white…"

"Of course, Miss—"

"And some orange ones, too, if you don't mind," she said softly, looking up at the maids with a smile.

.

.

Bijou had no idea if her plan on relinquishing her emotions was working. The only way to know for sure was to ask Monster himself, and there was no way that would ever happen.

Thankfully, the day came where Bijou didn't have to ask…

"Master Stanley asks about you very often these days," one of the maids said, her voice almost lost in a romantic trance as she leaned against Bijou's armoire.

Bijou dropped the pen she was using to make the 98th tally. The other maid smiled as she set up Bijou's breakfast tray on a table nearby.

"Oh?" Bijou asked, her voice saccharine. This news was something Bijou _needed_ to hear, but far from _wanted_ to hear.

"He worries about you. He can't grasp your emotions, but I think it's more because he's so used to seeing you upset and now…" the maid trailed off as she sighed.

"And now?" Bijou asked nonchalantly as she walked to her breakfast tray.

"Well, it's obvious, isn't it?" the other maid asked as Bijou sat down. She handed Bijou a fork for her scrambled eggs. Bijou looked at the maid, one of her eyebrows arched questioningly.

"You're so much happier these days! One doesn't need Master Stanley's powers to do that!" she cried, clapping her hands together in happiness.

Underneath the table, Bijou's fingers twitched excitedly.

"He said that?" she asked, donning a real smile for once. "He thinks I'm happier?"

"Yes! In fact—it almost worries him because it's such a drastic change!" The maids had never seemed so giddy.

If one looked carefully, Bijou's smile broke for the shortest of seconds as she thought.

"Well, time heals all wounds…"

She took a bite of her eggs with a satisfied smirk.

.

.

Bijou started focusing her energy into producing some genuine happiness. Stan didn't need to know the source of her happiness—which in this case was the fact that she seemed to be making progress—he just needed to see, or better yet _feel_, the effects.

"I can't believe the castle had a gallery and I never knew about it!" Bijou said in awe as she stepped into the marble room, adorned with sculptures, landscapes, portraits, and every other major art form one could think of. It was the day she put the one-hundred-twentieth tally on her little piece of stationary paper. She was running out of room.

Her voice echoed through the beautiful room. Every corner of the room—probably the size of half a football field—was decorated with artwork from the entire world over.

The collection easily rivaled a museum in terms of rarity and beauty.

"Well, it is a seldom-used part of the castle," one of the maids explained quietly as Bijou ran over to a Greek bust. "Master Stanley himself hardly comes in here."

"I wonder if he'll ever let me put one of my pieces in here," Bijou thought aloud as her gaze went heavenwards. The painting done on the ceiling had such painstaking detail, it was like Michael Angelo created this gallery himself.

"Oh, I'm sure he'll build a whole gallery for you, Mistress Bijou!"

"You think?" Bijou asked as she weaved through a forest of ancient Mesopotamian urns.

"Of course!" the maid agreed.

"Then I'll ask him about that the next time I see him," the green-eyed girl sighed as she flitted her fingers across the surface of one of the old pots.

The two maids almost fainted with the anticipation!

.

.

"It's a harp!" Bijou cried excitedly as she ran towards the stage of this opera-theatre-like wing of the castle.

The maids followed her down the aisle of the theatre reluctantly. Bijou had noticed they were seemed a little more hesitant than usual this morning, but that was most likely because she had decided she wanted to "explore" some more. She had no idea…

They were one-hundred and forty-seven tallies in.

One of the maids picked up the sketchbook Bijou had dropped in the middle of the aisle, her eyes softening as she held the book of the girl's creations. The other maid stood next to her, also pleased as she saw the girl ascend the stage, her golden gown flowing behind her as she sat at the ancient instrument.

"I used to play one, a long, long time ago," she explained as she strung her fingers along the length of the instrument. An unattractive, somewhat screechy sound came out, causing Bijou to wince.

"Oohh, the strings are out of tune! They need to be adjusted!" she said as she looked down at the theatre, expecting to see the maids there. However, as her eyes glanced through the aisles and velvet seats, she realized they were nowhere to be seen.

Bijou's hands fell from the instrument. She blinked a few times, making sure that her eyes weren't deceiving her.

"You guys?" she called, hearing nothing but the sound of her voice resonate through the area.

She felt her heart quicken in its pace, instinctively knowing that something bad was about to happen.

Bijou looked at the harp for a few seconds, idly placing her hand over the strings as she bit her lip nervously. _I should go find them…!_ Just a split-second after she made her decision, however, Bijou felt a chilling sensation sweep over her fingers.

"It's not out of tune. You just have to be very careful when dealing with such old instruments that you do not touch the strings too roughly. You'll find they will not respond as you would like, _Cherie_," he said, so very gently, as he took her hands and guided them across the strings.

A beautiful melody laced its way through the massive room.

Bijou shrunk inwards. Her eyes remained widened and petrified as he spoke from behind her, her entire body shivering from his ice-like temperature.

She thought she knew how to steel herself for this. She was waiting for their reunion, and she thought she would be strong. But all she could do was let out a nearly inaudible whimper as he hovered behind her.

"You seem so different these days," he explained as his hands rested on her shoulders. Bijou's lips trembled.

"Perhaps these few months of my absence have been good for you," he thought aloud, moving to her side. He kneeled, becoming lower than Bijou who kept her eyes straight ahead of her.

"I've been watching you for the past few days," he explained as his hands moved to the golden fabric on her lap. "And the changes I've seen in you…are…well, a little short of remarkable, really…"

A small, croak-like sound came out of Bijou's mouth as she continued staring ahead, her grip on the harp's strings so tight she was sure they would snap.

This was not how she was supposed to feel! She was supposed to feel hatred and disgust and the desire to avenge, yet instead…

…Monster could sense it as well…

…she was confused?

"Ahh, but it seems you have not missed me in the slightest," he said, sounding rather defeated. At this, Bijou turned and looked at his face for the first time in nearly five months.

His brilliant eyes still looked as vibrant as ever, and his handsome pale face looked untouched, as he would remain for the rest of eternity. The scars that the pterodactyls had left healed a while ago.

She shook her head without even realizing what she was doing. Her mind was in turmoil, however.

_How…why…? No, no, I couldn't have actually _missed_ him, could I?_

"Oh, _Cherie_," he said as his hands moved to rest under her chin, a gesture Bijou welcomed with a slight turn of her cheek into his fingers. "To have your eyes look so intently at mine! I couldn't ask for a better present!"

In a second, his face was almost pressed against hers, his lips separated by nothing but a thin film of air.

"But I must leave now. You still need more time," he said briskly. Bijou closed her eyes, expecting him to kiss her, but after a few seconds, she opened her eyes and realized he wasn't there. She was all alone on the stage once again, feeling as alone and abandoned as ever in his absence.

Wordlessly, she descended the stage and practically ran down the aisle of the little theatre, opening the door to it to find her two maids waiting patiently for her.

"Oh, Mistress Bijou!" one of them cried, pressing Bijou's sketchbook up to her chest. The maids couldn't discern Bijou's facial expression—they had no idea if she was happy or depressed, or some sad slurry of both.

"I want to go to my room," Bijou explained, biting her lip. "I do not want dinner; I just want to go to bed."

"Of course!" the maids nodded in unison. Bijou grabbed her head and walked past them, cursing at how obedient they always were.

.

.

When they got to the door of Bijou's room, Bijou paused. The maids watched—with a smile exchanged between the two—as Bijou looked down the corridor. Though she had her back to the maids, the way she longingly looked down towards the end of the castle where Stan's bedroom was located was practically tangible.

.

.

All the gardeners who worked on the castle's beautiful landscape ran inside, their clothes soaked with the arrival of the sudden storm. Bijou took a moment to step away from her easel as she stared out the stained-glass window, curiously wondering why she had been here for so many months, trapped in a world of cloud-stricken melancholy, and yet was only now witnessing a storm in the middle of the day.

"It drizzles everyday," she said to the maid that was sitting at the end of her bed, staring blankly out at the green fields, "but I've never seen it rain like this…"

"There are a few storms in this area, yes," the maid agreed, "but after the storm passes there are such beautiful flowers, and the smell of rain lingers for days all through the gardens, and oh, it's such a beautiful sight!"

Bijou remembered her childhood in France vaguely, though she did remember how excited she got whenever it rained. It that area of France, too, it didn't rain so heavily very often. Perhaps the castle was located not too far from her childhood mansion…

"Is it going to rain for long?" Bijou asked, turning back to the easel. She wondered how much access the maids had to the rest of the world. Did they have a TV that would tell them the forecast? A radio? A car? And how far were they from the rest of the world that she never heard a plane pass by or never saw any semblance from another human that didn't work for Stan?

"The storm will last all through the night," the maid sighed. Bijou picked up her paintbrush and continued adding strokes to the swans she had been painting.

She had added her one-hundred and sixtieth tally to the paper today.

Thunder crashed, and Bijou continued to mindlessly paint. It continued like this for a few minutes before something happened.

A drop of water fell from the ceiling, coming down onto Bijou's painting and leaving an unattractive streak of dark water across one of Bijou's swans. Bijou looked up and realized the roof was leaking, just as another drop of water came crashing down and fell into her lap, staining her pastel-pink gown.

Bijou pushed back her chair and stood up, more and more water falling faster as the storm outside got worse.

"A leak?" the maid asked worriedly as she joined Bijou, staring up at the roof.

"Two leaks," Bijou explained as she stepped back, the water falling harder and faster. "One right on top of the easel and the other right there," she added, pointing to the part of the roof she had been sitting under.

"I'll have someone fix this immediately," the maid said quickly.

"It seems like there's been a lot of water damage," the white-haired girl said quietly as she saw the stone of the castle's roof darkened with water.

"Well this castle is very old…" the maid started a bit defensively, looking around nervously. "Oh my…"

Bijou turned around to see what the maid was talking about. Her eyes fell on her bed where the salmon-pink sheets were being dampened by a leak on top of the center of her bed.

"I'll get a handyman immediately and I'll change your sheets before you go to bed tonight!" the maid quipped, signaling to Bijou that she'd be back in a few minutes as she ran out of the room.

Bijou looked around the room for a few seconds before she smiled.

"That's not really necessary," she said to no one in particular as she went to her bedroom door and opened it.

She knew exactly where she was going as she walked down the corridor, her heart fluttering with excitement and nervousness as she moved. She could feel her cheeks getting red and the smile on her face subconsciously grew. Bijou knew that getting this happy was not a good thing, but at this point, if one could not beat them, then why not join them?

She finally arrived at the door she was looking for, noticing the two guards that stood on either side of Stanley's door.

"I need to talk to him," Bijou explained, trying to stand up straight and look authoritative compared to the strong men in front of her.

The guards, like the maids, had been given orders to let Bijou do as she pleased, as long as her health was not endangered. Plus, the guards were pretty sure that this fragile little creature could not do any harm to their master, so they courteously nodded as one opened the door for the girl.

Bijou stepped into the room, looking around for a few seconds at the space she had spent a few nights in. His fresh smell, one that she sometimes thought was only meant for her to smell, lingered all throughout these four walls. The door shut softly behind her, and with equally soft steps, she padded her way across the room, staring at his sleeping form.

Her eyes softened as she sat down beside the bed, knees tucked under her, as she noted the lack of dark circles under his eyes. Had he eaten recently, she thought with an amused smirk.

"_Cherie_," he said, eyes starting to open as he looked at her. Bijou felt her heart stop in her throat.

"There's a leak in my room—well, actually, quite a few of them," Bijou said softly. "Are those the kind of conditions you expect your mate to live in?"

Stan sat up, unable to hide the look on his face. His legs fell over the side of the bed as he leaned towards Bijou.

"And what would you like me to do about that, exactly?" he asked, cupping her face in his hands.

"Fix the leaks, of course, but in the meantime…" she started to say, her eyes widening, "I need somewhere to sleep."

"My bedroom is the first place that came to mind?" he asked quietly as he pulled back from her, still smiling.

"Naturally. It's the only other place in the castle I've ever slept, and I would like to be as comfortable as possible," she explained as she now kneeled on her knees, supporting herself by putting her hands on his bent kneecaps.

"How long do you intend to stay?" Stan asked as he, once again, leaned back to Bijou.

"The storm will last al through the night, or so I've been told, so at least that long," she replied as she likewise brought her face up to his.

The two stared at each other for a few seconds, Bijou looking determined and Stan looking as if he was a kid that had just been given the key to the candy store.

He finally eliminated the distance between them, and she responded to his kiss graciously, finally telling him that she had accepted herself as his.

.

.

"I'm so happy for Master Stanley!" Sandy heard one of her maids pipe up as she walked down the corridor.

"Mmm-hmm! He seems so happy whenever he's with her—you can just tell!" the other maid added, though the two humans' voices quickly settled down as they finally saw Sandy on the other side of the hallway, realizing that despite the distance, she had heard their every word.

But Sandy chose to flash past them instead of punishing them for gossiping instead of doing their jobs. It seemed for the past three days, the entire castle was just _teetering_ on the news that Stanley and Bijou had finally become an official pair. She didn't understand what the big deal was; if Bijou was Stanley's mate, she would eventually gain feelings for him—this was all inevitable.

Stanley was happy. Good for him. He seemed to be in love, and his attitude had definitely changed. He was even _smiling_ on occasion, for the love of…

Sandy shook her head as she walked. All this talk of love was frustrating enough as it was. What was worse, her mind had been using that useless term as a trigger as of late.

Sandy looked up and sighed as she saw where she had, almost subconsciously, walked to: The Library. Filled with paper, tables, chairs and, above all…

…_books_…

She shook her head once again and turned around, walking as far away from it as possible but knowing she'd end up there yet again in a matter of time.

.

.

"Your newer art is easily comparable to some Renaissance landscapes I have in the castle gallery," Stan mused as he flipped through one of Bijou's many filled sketchbooks.

"Those are only my sketches," Bijou explained, "I think my oil paintings are a lot better, to be honest." She leaned her head on Stan's shoulders as the two swung on the wooden bench-swing that hung in one of the corners of the castle's gardens.

It was the middle of the night, yet Stan could see every detail of Bijou's art perfectly, causing Bijou to scrunch her face in confusion.

"Is your nocturnal vision _that_ good?" she asked a bit jealously. She could barely see a thing in this darkness!

It was five days after Bijou had first come to Stan's room because of the leaks. The leaks had since been long-fixed, but Bijou had yet to spend a night in her room.

"I _am_ a nocturnal creature, _Cherie_," he reminded as he continued looking through the book. "I can see far better than you can even in the best of light, especially at night. That's merely one of the perks of being a vampire."

"How far can you see?" she asked as she stared ahead into the darkness, only able to make out a vague outline of the path leading back to the castle because of the streetlamps that lit the path's way.

"I can see a bug crawling on the castle's walls," he said, never looking up. "There's an identical bug crawling on your skirt," he added as somewhat of an afterthought.

Bijou looked down and, sure enough, there was a brown thing with a lot of legs crawling on her gown, which was off-white with blue flowers.

"Acckkkk!" she cried as she frantically pushed the critter off her dress. She pulled her knees up to herself and unwittingly moved closer to Stan.

"It must be nice," she said bitterly, noticing Stan's laughter, "to have such heightened senses."

"They certainly are useful, and you will soon find that out yourself," he explained as he closed her sketchbook. Bijou repositioned herself so that she was once again leaning on him.

Bijou didn't say anything; rather, she just smiled, and all that Stan sensed was her serene mood.

Her eyes, however, told a completely different story…

.

.

Sandy wandered through the library as she peered through all the shelves and tables, the same ones she had paced thousands of times before…

…yet, she kept feeling like she was missing something. What was it about the library that seemed to rattle her through the day?

Or maybe she was missing _someone_?

_Books_. That's all she saw around her as she defeatedly sat down at a table. That's also one of the two things she remembered about her human life.

"Sandy!"

The vampire turned around, not surprised to see Bijou standing in the library's entrance with her two maids on either side of her. She was wearing a dark blue gown today, almost black. Along with it, she wore a matching cape that tied around her neck with a silver chain. The capes were something she had started wearing ever since she and Stan had "officially" embarked upon their romance. It made her look like a queen.

Sandy turned her head around, keeping her back to Bijou as the human came over to her table.

"My brother isn't with you?" Sandy asked, rather uninterested, as Bijou sat across from her at the table.

"Of course not!" Bijou exclaimed, looking rather confused. "It's actually very sunny today, and he decided he just did not have the energy, so he's resting," she reminded, turning her head and looking out one of the glass windows of the library.

"You should be resting as well!" she urged as she looked back at the vampire. Sandy had black circles around her eyes.

"Mistress Bijou!" the two maids called as they ran to Bijou. "Is there any book or genre of books you'd like for us to retrieve?" they asked expectantly, causing Bijou to roll her eyes.

"No, that's quite alright," Bijou replied, annoyed. "You two are dismissed for the day."

"But-" One of them started.

"My orders are final," Bijou added sternly. The maids hung their heads low, mumbling something about how lunch would be served soon, as they left the library.

"You've certainly learned to use your authority," Sandy noted.

"Well what's the point of power if one does not learn how to use it?" she replied, almost like a challenge, but Sandy dismissed that thought.

"What brings you here, Bijou?" The strawberry-blonde asked at length.

"I didn't feel like painting or sketching today," the human replied, waving her hands to the shelves of books around her. "I was hoping something here would entertain me until Stan wakes up!"

"And you don't feel tired at all? You're a human and need to sleep at some point or another…"

At this, Bijou smiled brightly, like a child who knew a secret. "Have you ever been so excited, Sandy, that you just cannot fall asleep?"

"Excitement?" Sandy thought aloud. For some reason unknown to her, she asked, "Is it love?"

"Love is definitely the driving force!" Bijou beamed, blushing.

Sandy sighed as she turned her head to the side, not really looking at anything as she lost herself in her thoughts.

"Though, Sandy, I suppose I could also ask you why you're here. You clearly have no desire to read books," Bijou observed.

"Bijou," Sandy said quickly, turning back to the emerald-eyed girl. "Do you remember when you asked me what I remembered about my human life?"

Bijou blinked. She did her best to keep her eyes from lowering, but she nevertheless smiled as she replied, "I do. You said ribbons and books." Her eyes suddenly widened. "Books…is that why you're here?"

"Can you ask me more questions?" Sandy asked, not really answering Bijou's question.

"You remembered something else," Bijou noted, tapping her lips with her finger.

"It was a simple question, Bijou," Sandy reminded, her eyes stoic. The white-haired girl shrugged her shoulders and put on an all-too-innocent smile.

"I'm sorry! I was just interested in what you might remember!"

"I remember fragments and voices, but I think your questions may trigger some more," she explained, her voice unmoving despite her inner despair.

"Voices, hmm?" Bijou wondered out loud. "Tell me, Sandy, do you remember ever being in love?"

"I told you the only things I remember," Sandy reminded. "That was not one of them."

"Are you sure?" Bijou asked as she stood up. "I think you should think about this for a while."

"That does not help me in the slightest," Sandy somewhat hissed as she watched Bijou walk away. As the human reached the entrance to the library, she gripped the side of the door and turned her head to the side, glaring at Sandy.

Sandy's lime-green eyes widened as she saw Bijou's stare, sharp and malignant enough to be that of a hungry vampire.

"I believe the emotions that remain with you the longest, and naturally the ones that remain strongest, are the ones of love. It is impossible to take that feeling away, regardless of time," she explained, letting go of the door and walking away.

Sandy did not know how to respond to such a statement. Should she tell Stanley? Yes, of course…Her voice was not jovial nor serene, but…

However, just as she herself stood up, a voice came into her head.

"_I…I love you too, Sandy."_

And the vampire sat down all over again, this time her face falling into her palms.

.

.

Though, Sandy's doubts would soon retreat like the ebb and flow of a tide.

While Sandy was lost in her own little dilemma of voices and fragments of memories, Bijou and Stan were finally getting to know each other.

"Honestly this invention seems like a complete joke, _Cherie_—absolutely ludicrous!" he explained as he walked through Bijou's bedroom, which had more or less become an art gallery since the girl hardly slept in it anymore.

"I believe you're just jealous because in your time, music could only be heard live through a concert," she replied wittily, turning around from her painting and arching an eyebrow at him.

"If one has a device that can hold nearly 100,000 songs—"

"And videos, and games, and pictures, too!" Bijou cut in.

Stan rolled his eyes. "Fine, _Cherie_. At the very least, if one carried around such a troublesome machine, they could put some music of quality onto it!"

"Well I suppose our definitions of quality music differ greatly," she replied, her voice feigning indignation as she closed both her eyes and stuck her nose in the air. She opened one of her eyes and beamed at Stan, whose lips twisted slightly, but his eyes remained apathetic.

"I believe anything that does not have woodwind, strings, percussion and brass sounding together in unison does not have the right to be called 'quality'," he explained as he came behind her, massaging her back as she rolled her head back and let herself bask in this pleasure.

"Clearly you two were not serious when you asked if I wanted to see your paintings," Sandy, who was leaning against the far wall, cut in, ready to leave. That's when Bijou perked up.

"No, wait! I wanted to show you something, Sandy!" she cried as she stood from her chair and dashed to her desk, pulling out a sketchbook which Bijou had actually filled with colored paintings. She hurriedly flipped through the pages and emerald eyes lit up when she found the one she was looking for.

"What do you think?" she asked slowly, turning around and handing Sandy the book.

Sandy's eyes widened.

There, in Bijou's watercolor, was a picture of a beautiful human with strawberry-blonde hair, soft pink cheeks, fair white—but not pale—skin, and lime-green eyes that seemed to light up the entire work of art.

There was also the fact that Bijou had chosen to draw this girl sitting at a table in the library, surrounded by a stack of books all strewn about the surface of the table.

"I was so inspired by seeing you a few days ago in the library," Bijou started, looking to the side nervously but then bringing her eyes back to the vampire, "that I tried to imagine what Human Sandy would've looked like!"

"What was so inspirational about me in the library?" Sandy snapped, looking at Bijou with green slits.

Bijou took a step back, looking down and quickly closing the book.

"I…I don't know. The questions you were asking me…they all seemed to full of emotion that I sort of let my curiosity get the best of me."

"Why would you even _try_ to draw me as a human? Is it some kind of reminder of the emotions that I'll _never _feel again?" Sandy's voice was getting louder as she came closer to Bijou. The brown-blonde curls around her head were falling loose, starting to reveal her power.

"Oh, just leave, Sandy! Honestly, how many people would _want_ you as the subject of their artwork, anyway? You should be thanking my dear mate for taking so much time and thinking about you," Stan intervened as he stepped between the two girls.

"I think your art is exponentially getting more and more beautiful, _Cherie_," he explained as he patronizingly patted her white locks, causing Bijou to blush.

Sandy hissed. "That picture of me…" she started, lips pressed tightly together before she could finish. _Is hauntingly familiar_.

"Will be destroyed," Bijou added, holding her arm with the other as she looked down yet again.

"There is no need for that, _Cherie_."

"Stanley!" Sandy was appalled. "I do not want anyone seeing it nor do I want to be reminded of the fact that I am not human!"

Stan paused, his hand resting on Bijou's head, his eyebrows raised.

"Are you saying that you would choose being human over being a vampire?" he asked quietly, very slowly folding his hands behind him.

Bijou looked down, silently absorbing every detail of this conversation.

"Of course not, Stanley," Sandy started, "but that part of my existence is over and done with and I'd prefer it if I never had to see a remnant of it again. You can understand this much!"

"Frankly, because I do not remember being a human at all, I am unfazed by it, so no, I do not understand," he replied calmly.

Sandy looked at Bijou, her mouth falling open at her brother's words. She looked at the human as if asking for help, but her emerald eyes remained downcast.

"For…forgive me, brother," Sandy finally sighed, putting a hand in her hair. "I need some sleep."

"I agree," Stan replied.

Doing a quick curtsy, Sandy hurriedly left the room, her eyes shaking as if her vampire shell could actually cry.

.

.

In the early, early morning two days later, Sandy heard a knocking on her door. Groaning, she sat up, the crimson sheets bunching around her as she barely let out, "Come in."

Bijou stepped in, opening the door to allow a waiter to bring in a trolley with a tea kettle and cups on it.

"Please pour the tea into a cup for her," she instructed, and obediently, the waiter poured some of the steamy beverage into a cup.

"I may be tired, but my vision is still acute enough to tell that there's no blood in that cup," Sandy noted. Bijou, keeping her lips pursed tightly together, nodded.

"And yet you expect me to drink it. Truly, Bijou, a human's stupidity knows no bounds."

Bijou nodded to the waiter, and he left the room.

"I may be stupid enough to be human, but I am human enough to understand," Bijou replied quietly, picking up a cup and saucer and bringing it to the side of Sandy's bed.

"You clearly don't understand anything," Sandy snipped. She turned her head and refused the cup.

"What's in there, anyway?"

Bijou sat on Sandy's bed, her bronze dress ruffling. "It's Ginkgo tea with some rosemary. I wanted to add some clarity to your thoughts and memories."

"Memories? I see you are still rude enough to bring up such a subject! You're ridiculous!" she spat, glaring at the human.

"I understand your pain," Bijou continued. "Your memories, and your overall attitude about your human life…you need closure on something, don't you? That's why I'm trying to help you get that."

"Leave," Sandy ordered. Bijou closed her eyes for a second but stood up nevertheless, leaving the cup and saucer on her bedside table.

"You told me you could be my greatest ally—I was trying to return that favor," Bijou mumbled as she opened the door and left.

As the door closed, Sandy looked at the tea. Bijou wanted her to drink tea. What a ridiculous notion! She didn't even know if her stomach worked, or if her body was capable of taking up nutrients from such food. Her body always reenergized immediately after drinking blood.

Still, she eyes the cup wearily.

_Thoughts and memories…_Bijou's voice echoed in her ears. The locks of her hair twisted around the nape of her neck, hissing how there was no need to indulge in human food.

But Sandy shushed her hair as she reached for the cup, and, hesitantly, put the cup to her lips. How long had it been since she drank tea? She couldn't even remember.

_Maybe I will now_…

She let the liquid pour over her tongue, wincing at the taste of something so unnatural and vile filling her. But she kept drinking, as if somehow hoping in Bijou's words.

.

.

Bijou shivered as she stood on the balcony. The clouds weren't gray anymore. They were white, a beautiful, pure sheet of white.

One-hundred and eighty tallies. One-hundred and eighty days. Six months.

"It'll snow soon," Stan explained as he came behind her.

"It should've snowed earlier, right?" Bijou asked, still staring upwards, as she thought. "It's around Christmas, I think…"

Honestly, not having a calendar or clocks made it difficult to keep track of time!

"The weather has been bizarre the past few years; it's been raining instead of snowing this winter," he explained, not really answering her question.

"They call that 'Global Warming'," Bijou hummed.

Stan "tsked", moving to her side as he continued staring at the sky. "It's the fault of the humans' incessant production of toxic gases."

Bijou smiled as she looked at him. "Excuse me. _I_ am one of those humans that used to travel in cars that only made the atmosphere worse! I resent your statement."

"You should. Killing the earth is not something to take lightly," Stanley added. Bijou looked at Stan for a second too long before she hurriedly moved to the other side of the balcony.

"Are you cold?" he asked, noticing that she had her bronze cape clutched to her body. As a naturally cold being, he felt no different in this weather than he did in the summer, so he wasn't particularly bothered.

"You found me in Japan," Bijou stated quietly as she sat on the ledge of the balcony, resting her shoulder against a circular stone at the corner of the stone overhang. Stan was a little worried so he silently moved a few steps closer, lest she need him to catch her.

"Will we travel when I become a vampire?" she asked as she finally looked at him.

He nodded, though a little taken back by her talking about becoming a vampire. "Of course, _Cherie_, wherever you would like."

"Well since we're already in France, can we see Fashion Week this upcoming fall?" she asked excitedly. "I've always wanted to see it!"

Stan scratched the bridge of his nose, though it wasn't itchy. "This fall is…"

"Still almost a year away! You don't think you'll turn me by then?" Bijou asked, her eyes starting to lose some hope as she realized the meaning behind his hesitation.

"I just think your mind will need a little more time to consider the consequences about being a vampire," he explained. "It's not a light decision."

Bijou's mouth fell open, and she quickly looked to the side so he wouldn't see her hurt.

"Well exactly how long did you have to think about it?" Her hand was over her mouth.

Stan placed both his hands over the ledge and sighed. "Less than five minutes."

His mate looked infuriated as her eyes snapped back to him. Stan sensed this, but chose to ignore it.

"And yet you think I'm not ready. Do you not trust me?"

"If you have someone to turn for, the amount of time you wait is irrelevant." Bijou's eyes narrowed. Who did _Stan_ turn for?

"You're contradicting yourself! Clearly, you don't trust me!"

"I trust you in complete, _Cherie_, but with such a high failure rate—"

"—You and Sandy turned out just fine," she reminded, temporarily ending that discussion as Stan quickly jumped onto a change in subject.

"How is Sandy? Have you checked on her?" Bijou huffed at Stan's topic change, but she nodded.

"I visited her this morning and she seemed fine—tired—but fine, for the most part."

She decided telling Stan about the tea she gave her was unnecessary.

"I cannot understand why she was so touchy over that picture. I'd love it if you tried to draw _me_ as a human, _Cherie_." Bijou smiled, adding a quick, "Then I'll paint you next!" before he added, "She must be remembering her human life…"

"Do vampires normally start remembering their human lives?" Bijou's eyes widened slightly, but she quickly readjusted her visage.

"Not normally." Stan was too lost in his thoughts to notice Bijou's expression. "But it's the best explanation for what's been going on as of late."

Before Bijou could say anything, a piece of frozen crystal fell down on her gilded lap.

"So it's finally started," she noted as more and more snowflakes fell around her.

"Were you waiting for the snow?" Stan asked, looking at her curiously.

Bijou shrugged as she leaned further against the circular stone.

"It seems all I do these days is wait."

.

.

Sandy was sleeping worse than ever. On top of the stress she had been reminiscing in for the past few days, consuming human food seemed to only make her body ail more.

_Stupid human_, she thought to herself. The curls in her hair whispered that they should bite her and kill her, but Sandy ignored them, too mad to think properly.

_What can she possibly understand, anyway? She knows nothing of throwing away emotions and never gaining them back. Perhaps when Stan turns her…_

Sandy, though she could never let her brother know it, secretly smiled at the thought of Bijou dying when Stan tried to turn her. _It's a shame. She was such a pretty girl, too…_

When Bijou had first arrived, Sandy had somewhat hoped she and her brother could "share" Bijou when she was turned. Nowadays, Sandy was more or less wishing for the girl's departure from their existences.

Sandy shut her eyes tighter, and as she lay there stewing in some unfamiliar emotions, or perhaps emotions that were far _too_ familiar, she dreamt of hallways and doors.

Yes…that seemed right…large hallways not made of stone like the castle but instead of wood with beautiful, vivid tapestries hung about and large glass windows that let in the gorgeous sunlight. But she was not paying attention to the tapestries or the beauty of the hallway; something more important seemed to be on her mind.

_Her green gown was bunched in her hands as she pushed through door after mahogany door, out of breath and hot tears streaming down her flushed cheeks. She had some sort of paper gripped between one of her hands and the fabric of her gown, and her sobs were starting to make it difficult to breathe. Voices of guards and maids were calling out after her, "Lady Sandy! Lady Sandy!" but she paid them no mind at all as she ran. _

_Finally, she reached a final door with large rod-iron handles. With a little effort, she finally opened it and ran outside to the stunning courtyard bespeckled with the greenery and lush atmosphere of the summer sun. _

_She ran through the fields until she finally saw, practicing archery under the shade of a willow tree, her twin brother._

"_Stanley! Stanley!" she cried as she approached him. Her breathing was so badly hitched that her words came out as choking sounds._

_The man in question turned at the sound of her voice and immediately dropped his bow as he saw her disheveled appearance. He ran to her. _

"_Sandy," he whispered as he came to her and held her tearful face in his hands. "What happened?"_

"_It's mother…and father…" she let out between her sobs. "There's been… an accident."_

_Shakily, she showed him the crumpled piece of paper in her hands. Stan hesitantly took the paper and cautiously started reading through it. His eyes widened and his own lime-green pupils were cast aside with tears._

"_Stanley…They're…they're dead!"_

Sandy did not wake up this time as her memories filled her. She subconsciously clutched the sheets around her tighter, reliving her nightmare once again.

.

.

"What's this?" Stan asked later that night as he came into the hallway, watching as a nightgown-clad Bijou carried pillows from Stanley's room into her old chamber.

"I decided that there's no point in living with someone who doesn't trust me," she explained as Stan flashed beside her, pouting as she carried a pillow and blanket in her arms.

Stan stepped in front of her, blocking her, "_Cherie_, you are taking this too seriously."

"No, actually, the one who's taking this too seriously is _you_, Stan. I guarantee that you could turn me right now with success, but you don't seem to believe me," Bijou replied, sidestepping Stan and carrying on her merry little way.

"Please try to understand that I am just trying to ensure not losing you," he reminded as he once again stepped into place with her.

"You just told me today that time is irrelevant if you have someone to turn for," the human said quietly as she stood in the doorway of her room. "I have you, don't I? Not to mention that you apparently were able to turn with less than five minutes notice."

Stan pursed his lips. "That's true, but my reason for turning went beyond a mate." His voice was quiet, subdued.

Bijou's anger—or was it jealousy?—was written all over her face. "What could be more important for a vampire than his mate?" Her hand was on the doorknob, ready to go in as soon as he gave his answer.

He looked down, remembering something he clearly did not want to share.

"…My sister," Stan said softly. "I turned for her."

Bijou's eyes softened at the vampire's clear love for his sister, but she shook her head.

"I'm sorry I cannot compete with a bond of blood," she sighed. "Perhaps you never wanted to turn me after all."

With that said, she entered her room, but Stan came in before she could close the door.

"Of course I plan on turning you, _Cherie_, but a few months' time is not going to change all that much," he tried to plead as he followed her to her bed.

"You will keep prolonging this for a few months, which will eventually turn into a year, and a year will fade into years and then what?" Bijou snapped, keeping her back to him as she moved some rolled up canvases off her bed and placed them on the nearby desk.

"I will just keep aging, eventually becoming older than you, and you won't care for me the same way!" she seemed exasperated, finally looking at him with defeated eyes as she gripped the side of her desk.

Stan immediately came in front of her, embracing her in his freezing hold.

"That will not happen,_ Cherie_, I refuse to let it. I will never let you age and leave me," he whispered into her hair.

"I'm asking you to give me the chance to spend an eternity with you, and you keep refusing. I feel so…untrusted and unimportant," she cried into his chest.

"I will…I will turn you before the coming of next fall. How does that sound?" he asked her, and he felt Bijou stiffen in his hands.

"I think you should leave," she said, looking to the side as she pulled away. Clearly, that was not what she had wanted to hear. She wanted to hear that he would turn her soon, and his latest response did nothing but heighten her anxiety.

Stan should've argued. He was incredibly intelligent, and he knew his reasons were very well-based, but Bijou clearly was not thinking logically, so with a swift, cold kiss, he left her.

Soundlessly, the girl went to her bed and collapsed into the pink sheets.

She let herself fall apart for a few seconds as she apathetically stared upwards, clutching the heart that still had yet to heal.

.

.

Stan was shocked when, in the middle of the next day, Sandy appeared on his bed, her knees tucked under her and her eyes a little too expectant.

"Sandy—" he started as he sat up, blinking to make sure he wasn't imagining such a thing.

"Stanley," she said almost immediately, and Stan was shocked to sense that the vampire was drowning in a state of confusion. She practically reeked of it.

"Do you remember our human life?"

Bijou watched with narrowed eyes as her two maids sniffled as they set up her breakfast tray. Both of their eyes were puffy and their faces were unnaturally pale.

"You two are sick," she noted as she started got up and went to the two.

One of them nodded meekly while the other blew her nose forcefully into a handkerchief.

"Normally, be don't go to the mahket, bot since you've come hee, we 'ave 'ad to go out a lot," she explained in her drastically nasal tone.

"Well you two are dismissed until you are back to normal!" Bijou said worriedly, not unlike a mother and her children. "You have to get some rest! I can take care of myself and get my meals for the next few days."

The two maids exchanged a nervous glance before shaking their heads.

"The kitchen is vewy cold. Masster Stanley wood nevah allow it!" she cried before she sneezed forcefully into a tissue she pulled out just in the nick of time.

"Then…that means the entire kitchen staff must be sick?" Bijou asked. When the two maids nodded, Bijou shook her head.

"Then I give every staff member direct orders to take a few days to themselves until they feel better, and that includes you two," she explained. While it was true that Bijou was very worried for the kitchen staff that served her three meals a day in the apparently cold kitchen, she also had to be practical and realize that she could not eat any of her meals until the staff was better.

"I can cook things too, you know. Just tell everybody down there to vacate the kitchen area immediately and not to come back until they are a hundred and fifty percent, understood?"

The maids nodded.

"Good. So we're clear."

.

.

Perhaps it was because Bijou hadn't really been outside all that much recently, or that the fireplace was always roaring in her room, or that she was always surrounded by her blankets and heavy gowns because she could be, but as she descended into the kitchen and servants' quarters, she started sneezing immediately.

Despite the fact that she was shivering, she shook off her sneezing fit as some response to the pepper in the kitchen air or something…

She was surprised to find that the kitchen was actually stocked with top of the line stainless steel appliances and was actually very modern-looking with shiny granite countertops and what looked like new, cherry-wood cabinets. Perhaps the maids weren't kidding when they said their master was very kind to them. She briefly wondered what their bedrooms were like as she glanced around at the sink, the cutlery, the pots and pans hanging over the island…and…

Her eyes widened…

There was also a phone.

It hung beside the fridge.

With no one around, Bijou eyed it, freezing in her place as she stared.

She gulped, stepping towards it, but then immediately stepping back as she went to the fridge. She shivered as she opened it, for the cold air that came out did nothing but make her body yearn for the warmth of her bed some more.

She found a bag of apples chilling in the fridge. Without dwelling on it for too long, she grabbed the bag and ran upstairs into the downy embrace of her sheets.

.

.

Bijou dropped her paintbrush, and, without bothering to pick it up, stood—albeit weakly—and walked to her bed. She had been living on apples for the past three days, and perhaps the lack of a variety of food was making her dizzy. Either way, her head was spinning and she needed some more rest.

Though, it was the middle of the day and she had only awoken a couple of hours earlier…

She had no idea how weak she was until she laid down and realized she didn't have the energy to get back up at all. She moaned as she realized what had happened.

Bijou thought about Stan, hoping he would sense her and come…

.

.

"Hmpf. Since you decided to dismiss the kitchen staff because of their illness, I was planning on having all the food in the kitchen be disposed of since it most likely contained their germs, as well as the germs of those who frequent the marketplace that the food was bought at…"

Stanley paced around Bijou's bed, watching as the girl who had a fever of one-hundred and three, looked at him wearily.

"…I had no idea you would actually eat some of the food," he added as he gripped the end of her bed. He was, truthfully, worried, for he hadn't had to deal with the repercussions of a fever in well over a century and not to mention, during his era a fever this high would easily kill someone.

Bijou shivered, though her temperature was ridiculously high. She was pressed under blanket after blanket. Her eyes could barely stay open and her head throbbed.

"Then," she started, her voice low, "turn me. You'll never have to worry about me getting germs again."

Stan looked at her. His eyes were slightly narrowed. A servant girl, a young one that Bijou couldn't ever remember seeing before, came in with what looked like comfy clothes in her hands.

"Put these on for tomorrow," Stan said, looking at the clothes that had been set on the edge of the bed. "You'll be visited by a doctor."

That's all he said as he turned around and left, leaving Bijou's head spinning.

She looked at the clothes: a small gray tee and black sweatpants. But that's not what fazed Bijou the most.

_Doctor_…a human one?

Bijou felt sick and hung her head over the side of the bed, letting her nausea take over.

.

.

Bijou had somehow managed to change her clothes and put her hair up into a messy ponytail by the next morning, a task that took much longer than anticipated.

She sighed as she stretched her weak arms, barely lifting them up as she wondered when the doctor would arrive.

_It'd be nice if Stan told me when he was coming…_But then again, knowing the time wouldn't matter since there were no clocks to keep track of time, anyway. That was something she needed to talk to her mate about.

Bijou scrunched her face, relaxing back into the pillows and thinking. What would be the proper term for her and Stan's relationship? Girlfriend-boyfriend seemed too juvenile, as what they had easily passed through a simple relationship. She wasn't sure if "mate" was the correct term either since she wasn't a vampire. Perhaps her feelings for him would get stronger once she turned. Well, she could only wonder about that for now.

It was evening and the girl looked out at the window to her left. There was snow bunched across the sills. She wanted to go outside and make a snowman, she realized, or maybe draw a snow hare or ptarmigan; however, she knew deep down that she wanted a little more.

Bijou wanted to leave these castle walls. She wanted to go travel or just _leave_ the property, even for a few minutes. Having been holed up here for seven months was getting a little irksome.

But Stan had his reasons for making sure she never left. It's why he called the doctor on a house call instead of taking her to a clinic.

"_Cherie_," Stan said as he opened the door, and as Bijou turned her head to look at him, she was breathless. Instead of his ballet-esque tunic and pants, Stan had on a button-down men's shirt which hung over his dark wash jeans. His hair was even styled to fall handsomely into his face.

Bijou was startled. "Your clothes…!"

Stan appeared by her side, confused at first before realization dawned on him. "Ahh, yes, _Cherie_, I suppose I've never had a reason to change into these kind of clothes while you have been here."

She nodded. Bijou knew he did a lot of travelling, so it was only natural that he would have a part of his wardrobe dedicated to dressing modernly. He smelled nice, too. Perhaps he was wearing some new cologne, though Bijou preferred his natural scent.

"The doctor will be arriving shortly," he explained as he sat down beside her.

Bijou tiredly nodded. "Stan, I was wondering…" Stan looked at her expectantly. "Well, I was sort of hoping you'd take me travelling after I get better."

Stan looked away. "_Cherie_, you know I can't take you out until I turn you."

"But you won't turn me!" she tried to cry, but her voice came out weak. "And I don't want to be holed up in this castle anymore, so why won't you let me go out without turning me?"

When Stan had no answer and kept looking down, Bijou felt tears run down her cheek.

"You don't trust me," she said to herself, sniffling. "This isn't the first time I've had to voice that thought."

"I love you, _Cherie_," Stan finally replied, looking at the girl intently at long last. "I don't think I've ever said that to you before, nor anyone else for that matter."

Time stopped. Bijou's tears stopped falling as she took in his words. This was…this was amazing! She opened her mouth to respond, however, a servant girl came in before anything could be said.

"Mr. Stanley, Ms. Bijou," she started, causing Bijou to look confusedly at her. _Mister_ Stanley instead of _Master_ Stanley? "The doctor has arrived."

_Ahh_, Bijou noted to herself as Stan stood up in order to greet a Ham-Human man in his late forties with a large black bag in his hands.

"Mr. Tigre," he said as he extended his hands. "Your property is beautiful!"

It seems Bijou was getting nothing but surprises today. She just realized she had never known Stan's last name!

"Thank you." Stan shook the doctor's hands. The doctor was a little taken back at first at a) how cold Stan's hands were and then b) how handsome Stan was, even though the Doctor was a happily married man with kids. He couldn't help but think of him as incredibly attractive.

Bijou was mildly amused at how his pompous, eloquent voice dropped in order to speak more like a man who looked his age should. "After my fiancée is treated, I'd be more than happy to give you a tour."

Bijou's eyes suddenly attained a dead stare, something no one in the room seemed to notice.

"Of course," the doctor said, turning his head to look at Bijou. He walked over to her and sat down in the recliner next to her bed. As he pulled latex gloves out of his bag, he took a brief look around the room.

"You like to paint, Miss…"

"Ribon, Bijou Ribon," she said as she smiled weakly, and likewise sharing her maiden name with Stan for the first time. "And yes, painting passes the time well."

Stan leaned on one of the posters of Bijou's canopy as he narrowed his eyes, watching as the doctor put a stethoscope under Bijou's shirt. Why he didn't get a girl doctor, now that he thought about it, was beyond him.

"Your heartbeat is completely normal," he explained as he finally pulled out the stethoscope and pulled out a blood pressure cuff. "But your fiancé told me you've been feeling nauseous and dizzy as well as very weak."

Bijou winced as the man pressed the little bulb of the machine and the cuff tightened around her arm.

"Yes, sir," she agreed.

"Hmm, your blood pressure is a little high as well. And there's no chance you're pregnant?" he asked as he took off the cuff and instead pulled out a thermometer.

What would her answer have been less than a year ago, Stan and Bijou wondered to themselves. Stan noted the sudden sullen look that came over Bijou as the girl realized that her answer was, and forever would be,

"No," she said quietly. She opened her mouth for the thermometer.

"Then you probably have the flu that's been going around. Have you been vaccinated?"

Bijou shook her head.

"Then just to be sure, I'm gonna have to draw some blood and run a lab test on it," he explained as he pulled out the thermometer. As he saw the severity of her fever, his eyes widened.

"Is everything alright?" Stan asked, sensing the alarm.

"Your fever is dangerously high," the doctor explained, turning to Stan. "We normally admit people with temperatures this high."

Bijou and Stan exchanged a quick glance.

"But you seem stable for the moment, so all I'll do is draw some blood. However, if your symptoms change in the slightest—and I mean any escalated bouts of nausea, weakness, loss of appetite, etc.—you have to come to the hospital immediately, understand?" he asked Bijou. The girl nodded, wondering where the nearest hospital was.

He pulled out a needle, two empty vials and a tourniquet. He started tying the band around her left arm, preparing her.

"So you don't think she can rest this out?" Stan asked. The doctor shook his head as he sterilized Bijou's arm with some alcohol.

"I doubt it at this point. From my experience, this will only get worse, in which case she has to be brought in for some serious medical care. This blood test will just tell me if she has H1N1. Either way, she'll probably have to be brought in."

Stan looked down just in time to see the doctor pierce Bijou's skin, instantly filling the empty vial with beautifully dark liquid, liquid that Stan could smell from where he was standing as it called for him.

He clutched the poster of the bed harder as the doctor started on the next vial. Bijou noted his distress, but couldn't figure out if her blood was making him weary or if he was worried about actually having to take her to the hospital.

She wondered briefly what would happen if she was taken to the hospital. Would someone ask for her medical records? If so, she'd have to give her name, obviously, and she had been told that the federal government had been contacted when she disappeared. Would they find out…?

Bijou's eyes widened just as the second vial filled with her blood.

"The nearest hospital is a little far from here, isn't it? Would you recommend me travelling in my condition, doctor?" she asked, causing Stan to look up in surprise and likewise earning a strange look from the doctor.

"It's only about a half-hour's drive," the doctor explained, giving Bijou an idea of where civilization was from here. "And you certainly seem stable—at the moment—for the journey."

"But if my condition gets worse, I think it's best just to deliver the medicine here," she added.

"At a certain point, medicine is not enough. You're condition is already bad enough that you would need to be hospitalized at any point—"

"But I'm stable and am having this perfectly clear conversation with you, aren't I?" Bijou countered. The doctor pursed his lips like he were about to give a lecture to a child.

"Miss Ribon—"

"I don't really like hospitals," she started to explain, looking up at the ceiling and putting a finger to her lips. "I haven't since I was a kid. I'll do pretty much anything to avoid them."

The doctor sighed, "If things get worse, I suppose we can send a live-in nurse over, but either way you'll need attention if your condition changes at to a fatal level at the eleventh hour."

"If things get worse, you'll find out," Bijou concluded.

"Doctor," Stan said, getting the attention of the other two, "thank you for examining my fiancée. I can give you the tour of the castle now, if you'd like."

The doctor gave one strange look to Bijou before he turned to Stan and said, "Umm, yes, why not."

Stan walked to the other side of the room, opening the door and gesturing for the doctor to follow. After a moment of collecting his instruments, the doctor hurriedly wrote a prescription on a piece of paper, telling Bijou something quickly about taking something three times a day before every meal. He then got up and left.

"I'll be right with you," Stan added as he swiftly closed the door behind the doctor.

He turned to Bijou with a coy look.

"I'm surprised you didn't jump at the chance to go with the doctor to the hospital," he said as he flashed by her side, sitting on the bed and clutching her hand.

"And you just proved you don't trust me," she replied as she looked the other way.

"You've proven me wrong," he admitted. "I was wrong—and I am not so stubborn as to deny that."

Bijou winced—her head was getting dizzier—as she turned and faced him.

"So where do we go from here?"

.

.

However, Bijou's condition did nothing but worsen.

.

.

With a sigh, Stan took a look at his sleeping mate. She had been sleeping for most of the past two days. Her appetite gone, he had predicted that she wouldn't have the energy to live much longer.

The doctor had called Stan's private study yesterday to inform him that Bijou did indeed have the new influenza that seemed to be affecting the humans as of late.

"_At this rate, she'll die without treatment!"_

He closed the door and walked through the halls of his castle. One of his hands was clutching his blonde bangs and the other was curled into a vengeful fist.

Stan couldn't lose his precious mate, but if he took her to a hospital, then surely it would be discovered, ultimately, that Bijou was the missing girl from Japan that had the media buzzing. And even if he chose to have a nurse come and take care of her, Bijou's medical records would be needed, and either way, she'd be taken away from him.

Or…

Stanley stopped in the middle of the corridor as he thought.

If he turned her…

Shaking his head, he immediately dismissed the idea. It was far too early, and in her state of weakness, her will to live on as a vampire would most likely be diluted.

It had been a while since he walked through the castle. Flashing was always so much more convenient and time-saving. Therefore, he didn't realize it as he passed the doors he would normally zoom by, such as his twin's room in which the aforementioned girl was drowning in the sea of her tragic memories.

.

.

_The aftermath of their parents' deaths had not been emotionally pleasant for the Tigre twins. _

_Nevertheless, Stanley had decided to take on an unfazed façade. Because of his father's death, he was now the Duke of this county, and for the sake of the people he had some authority over as well as his fragile twin sister, this mask proved to be quite necessary._

_Stanley was in his late father's office as he worked on some paperwork which he would have liked to finish as soon as possible. The truth was, the young man didn't like to come in here very often, as it had only been a few weeks since his parents' early departure from this life. _

_It was a beautiful day outside. The stagnant wind of the summer let every sound from the outside world be carried in with crystal clear clarity. Stan used the melody of a few nightingales to calm him as he worked._

_However, the he was interrupted as he heard a symphony of trumpets in the distance._

_Curious, Stan went to the window of his office and stared out. Indeed, there was a caravan of carriages, painted with a majestic red color, marching through the hills and towards his castle._

_His eyes widened as he realized who was coming, or more accurately, who sent these carriages._

_He dashed out of his office, running towards the entrance foyer._

"_Raise the front gates!" he informed the guards that were standing at the main doors of the castle._

"_Right away, Sir!" the guards, dressed in mesh, replied as they not only raised the gate they were standing at, but left the castle in order to inform the guards standing at the gates of the property to raise the barrier._

_The sound of the trumpets only became clearer, and Stan tensed as to what such an important visitor wanted. _

"_Stanley?" Stan turned around to see his sister, so pretty and innocent (and still very fragile after her parents' passing), standing with one hand on the frame of the doorway. She was still in her nightgown, a blue silky gown that fell to her ankles. The trumpets had disturbed her sleep, and the confused look on her face mirrored what her twin was feeling on the inside._

"_You should get back to bed," her brother said calmly as he approached her._

"_No, Stanley, I…" she paused as she stepped forward. "I…heard those horns going off, so I looked through the window and I saw…the king's carriages?" she was unsure of how to finish that statement._

"_Do you have any business with the king?" she asked quietly._

"_I don't," he replied, almost as quietly. "Perhaps he's sending his condolences? I believe he and father were somewhat well-acquainted. Either way, you're not exactly presentable at the moment, Sandy, so you might want to go back to bed."_

_Sandy looked down, "Alright, Stan…"_

_However, just as she turned to leave, the trumpets' tune changed. Their song got faster and faster, louder and louder, until ultimately…_

"_Duke Tigre, Lady Sandra," a messenger dressed in the royal red colors of the king announced as he came through the raised gates, a trumpet player on either side of him._

_Sandy paused and Stanley turned around, nodding for the messenger to continue._

"_His royal highness sends his sincerest condolences with regards to the deaths of the former Duke and Duchess of this duchy," he added, reading off of his scroll._

"_By all means, do tell his Majesty that we are humbled by his message," Stan replied as he wrung his hands nervously. He didn't know why he was so anxious…it was as if he had a sixth sense going off about this impromptu visit. Something, though he couldn't tell what, was amiss._

_If only he knew how to read people better!_

"_His highness understands that this must be an excruciatingly trying time for you, especially with Lady Sandra still in an unbetrothed state," the messenger read, causing both twins in the room to tense. Why was Sandy's marital status being brought into this?_

"_Once again, we are honored by his Majesty's concern. He is far too kind," Stan added, stepping towards the messenger and wishing for this visit to end quickly. But the cursed man kept reading._

"_Therefore," the messenger continued, grinning almost wickedly at Stan at this point, "his Majesty, the King, has made an offer in order to lessen the stress on the new Duke, Stanley Tigre."_

"_An offer?" Stanley laughed nervously as Sandy put a hand to her mouth, both of them knowing fully well what was to come. _

_If only Stanley could know what peoples' intentions were! He would have never raised that gate if he knew what the messenger had known!_

"_Indeed. The King has asked for Lady Sandra's hand in marriage."_

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Bijou's eyes "opened"—in reality her lids were barely separated—and she saw Stanley sitting by her bedside.

"Please eat," he said quietly, bruised eyes contrasting sharply with the bright sky outside. He had a tray of food in his hands, but Bijou put a hand over her mouth and shook her head. Just the thought of food made her want to throw up.

"You haven't eaten in four days," he explained, startling Bijou. She had been sleeping so much due to her fatigue that she didn't even realize how much time had passed between her meals.

Her throat was so dry. She tried to clear it, realizing how difficult speaking would be.

Bijou tried sitting up, and it was then that she realized there was an IV stuck in her left wrist, as well as a computer measuring her vital signs. Yes, now that she concentrated, she could feel the electrodes taped to her chest above her heart.

"I've ordered a live-in nurse for you," he explained as Bijou looked at the screen of the computer. "But you're not responding to the medicine they give you, _Cherie_. You didn't respond to the original prescription the doctor gave you, either."

Stan smacked the tray of food out of his lap, fisting his hair once again as he lowered his head. Bijou noticed he was wearing his "modern" clothes again.

She pressed her back into her pillows as she bit her lip, looking up at the ceiling of her bedroom and wondering, _Is this it? Am I going to die now?_

Stan seemed to sense her questioning state of mind, and he laughed sadly as he, keeping his head down, decided to enlighten her.

"The nurse told me that they want to take you to the national hospital, because apparently the care there is the best in all of France, as well as the most advanced antibiotics for this disease available. But she thinks even _that_ will be useless since your symptoms are almost exactly the same as the cases of the fatalities that there have been so far."

Stan was shocked when he felt her small, pale hands grab the fabric of his shirt. He looked up at her. Her emerald eyes were looking directly at him, and he couldn't ever remember sensing such an intense desire coming from her.

"I…I don't want to die," she told him, her voice groggy but clear.

"Believe me, _Cherie_, we desire the same thing…!" he replied exasperatedly.

Bijou folded her hands in her lap, continuing to state at him.

"Then turn me. Right now," she asked.

"_No_," Stan replied, without question, flashing to the window and staring out at the sun that was destroying him instead of looking at his mate.

"But I'm going to _die_," Bijou reminded, her voice cracking with each passing second.

"This is the most optimal time for you to try!" she continued, watching Stanley walk away from the window but always keeping his back to her.

"You are still unbelievably weak, _Cherie_—your body may not physically be able to handle it," he said quietly.

"But I refuse to die. My resolve should be enough!" she pleaded, leaning forward, despite how her head was spinning.

"I cannot be the cause of your death, _Cherie_, please try to understand this," Stan replied, now sitting on her bedside and cupping her colorless face in his frigid hands.

"And yet, you'll be ok when I die, knowing that you didn't do everything you could to try and save me?" she asked, grabbing his wrists with her graceful fingers.

Stan looked to the side, uncertain about what action to take next.

"There's not much time left nor do I have many options," she continued, clutching his wrists to her heart.

"You might die because of me," the vampire reminded. "I do not think I can handle that."

"I will come out successfully, that's my promise," she said as a tear fell from her eye.

"_Please_, Stanley." She was begging him at this point. "How much longer can I last like this? A day? Two days?"

Stan quickly glanced at the computer screen that was measuring her heart rate. The nurse had told him that her health, in all aspects, was getting worse by the day.

"I…I will do it," he finally said, looking at the screen. He turned to Bijou, emerald eyes widened and looking more awake than they had in days.

"R-really?"

The computer screen started showing an increased heart rate for Bijou, though it was still too low for a healthy human.

"There is no need to be nervous_, Cherie_. This should only hurt for a few seconds," he said, though he himself was quite hesitant about how to continue.

Gently, he pushed her back onto the bed and used his elbows to support his figure over hers.

"Oh…ok," Bijou choked out as she felt his cold face nuzzle her neck, searching for her the perfect area to bite her.

"Think, _Cherie_," he started, ignoring her shivers, "of the very reason you do not want to die."

A vision came into Bijou's head. She suddenly relaxed under him, letting out one final, deep breath as she nodded.

"I'm ready."

Stan closed his eyes. One of his hands instantly went to her right shoulder, pressing her down and preventing her from moving. He heard her gulp as he stroked her jugular vein.

Finally, his fangs came out. These were the fangs he had only shown Bijou once before—the night they had their first dinner together. These were much longer than the fangs used to bite into his meals. They were sharper, meant to go deep into the flesh and change the physiology of the target's body forever.

And, keeping his eyes closed, he used the smell of her sweet blood to guide him as he plunged his albino daggers into her.

Bijou gasped, thrusting her chest up as she grabbed the sheets around her and screamed. Her pupils became tiny green dots as her cries filled the room, echoing through the stone halls and filling the resounding in the ears of the vampire on top of her.

But he could not stop, despite her squirming in pain at the feeling of her blood changing its consistency or how her body was strengthening—_hardening_—for he was not done. He could not leave her mid-transformation, it would be all or nothing. It had to be.

"_NO, STOP!"_ Bijou managed to cry out as she flailed beneath him, trying to escape but continuously pushed back down by Stanley's hands. His eyes were still closed, but he could feel it, the mixing of his venom with her body. He could smell the pools of her blood slowly change.

Her cries overshadowed the beeping of the monitor beside her. Its signals were flashing red, alerting the two beings in the room that there was something dangerously wrong happening to Bijou.

She writhed in pain, grabbing the sheets around her so forcefully that her nails were causing holes in the silky pink fabric.

The venom was going through her systemic circulation, reaching her appendages and changing them, the organs in her abdomen, the millions of vessels in her brain corrupting her neural tissue, then slowly, it made its way back through the veins, coming back to her heart.

_Hair lengthening, teeth becoming sharper._ Her cells were changing. They would no longer utilize ordinary food as energy. Her blood was stopping, never to circulate through her body again. Her vessels were shriveling away, moving deeper into her body and away from her skin, making her already pale complexion fade all the more.

Any impurity she had was being accounted for. Any scars, any sort of blemish in her skin was being fixed. She was becoming a creature that was so stunning on the outside that no mortal could resist her calls. She was turning into a monster.

This was happening. Just a little longer…

Bijou's final breath was taken just as the last piece of her to change, her heart, contracted violently, only to stop, along with the monitor's beeping, as it beat one last time.

Stanley opened his eyes just in time to see Bijou collapse underneath him.

The monitor was flat. Bijou was very much dead at this point.

"_Cherie_!" he cried, shaking her.

But Bijou did not move. Her eyes were closed, and her cold body showed no signs of ever moving again.

"_Cherie_!" he tried again, shaking her even more violently. When she didn't move, he grabbed his hair again, his eyes trembling as he stared at her lifeless body.

"Bijou…_Bijou_…" he mumbled to himself maddeningly, still leaning over her as he started to panic. He knew she wasn't strong enough. He knew it was too early! Why didn't she listen to him? He was only looking out for her! And now he had lost her forever!

What was he going to do? He had lost the love of his life!

His eyes were now bolted shut as his head rested on her small torso, the torso that no longer rose with each passing breath.

Suddenly, he felt a cold hand touch the side of his cheek.

He immediately sat up, his eyes widening at the sight in front of him:

A very awake Bijou, emerald eyes (did they get greener?) blinking at him.

"_Che_…_Cherie_…?"

He could not believe it as he hesitantly reached out and touched her face.

It was like an ice cube.

Stan pursed his lips together, not knowing what to do next.

"Hi…," he finally let out, finally smiling, stroking the side of her face lovingly as Bijou continued looking up at him.

"Hi, Stanley," she responded, smiling and inadvertently showing him her fangs for the first time. Stan's undead heart swelled with pride.

Her voice had never sounded healthier.

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"Look at you, Bijou!"

Early the next morning, Bijou was woken up by a frantic Sandy leaning against her four-poster bed.

"Sandy…?" Bijou asked, her voice confused as she wasn't used to seeing Sandy like this.

"I cannot believe my brother changed you and did not think to tell me!" she cried as she sat on Bijou's bed, never tearing her lime-green eyes away from her.

"Oh, but look at what a pretty vampire you've become! Your eyes are bigger! You hair looks longer! And the shape of your face changed, too!"

Bijou remained silent. It was true, she had seen her reflection in the mirror of her bathroom's vanity earlier that morning. Her eyes did become bigger, and a lot more vibrant. Her hair had grown to frame her face beautifully and had attained a slight wave. The rest of her face had shifted into a slightly more heart-shaped appearance.

Other parts of her body had physically been altered as well. Her figure was just a bit more hourglass now with slightly wider hips and chest.

But she had not just changed physically.

Her vision was so unbelievably perceptive. She could focus on every dust particle hanging off her ceiling, see the birds sitting on trees yards and yards away from her window, notice every dent and chip in every piece of furniture all over her room. And the colors were so much richer and well-defined! Nothing looked as she remembered it.

She could also hear the whispers of the maids as they passed through corridors on the other side of this wing of the castle. This was incredible! She felt so amazing and energized, though her body was still too new to this to be moving around, at least that's what Stanley had told her.

However, Bijou could not say the same to Sandy. Physically, the girl had such dark circles under her lime eyes that Bijou figured the girl had not eaten in well over a couple of months, nor had she gotten any sleep. Her eyes were also shaky, and her smile was plastered on as if she was trying to show the rest of the world how _happy_ she was.

"Sandy, you're unstable," Bijou noted.

"No, no, no, I'm fine," the older vampire replied, grinning at Bijou in a way that caused the girl to cringe.

"I believe you need some more rest," Stanley said, appearing out of nowhere and grabbing Sandy by her arm.

Bijou smiled at her mate for coming just when she needed him. Sandy, on the other hand, looked exactly like a child being punished for a crime she did not know she committed.

"Stanley, I feel fine!" she cried as he lifted her up.

"Mmm, I do not doubt that for a second," Stanley continued as he led her to the door, both of the twin vampires unaware of Bijou's slight smile.

"Then why won't you let me stay with Bijou?"

"Because _she_ is the one who needs the rest," he lied as he opened the door and left the room, Sandy pinned to his side.

"She looks fine to me," Sandy complained, pouting. The door to Bijou's room shut behind them.

"I know, Sandy, I know."

Stanley continued leading the girl, slowly, down the corridor to her room, but already he could sense Sandy falling back into the depression she had been in as of late.

This worried him. Since when was Sandy able to feel these emotions?

"Stanley," she started quietly. If she were able to cry, the shakiness of her voice revealed she would have been sobbing by this point.

Rather than give into her questions, Stan remained quiet. However, Sandy took this as her cue to continue.

"You never answered my question. Do you remember our human life?"

When her brother remained quiet, she egged him on.

"Well, do you? Our parents? Their deaths? The king of this castle—"

"I've told you before," Stanley said, suddenly pinning his sister against the wall of the corridor, holding her by the neck, "that none of that seems familiar to me in the slightest. I did not feel the need to repeat myself, nor should you be letting the memories of decades past affect you so!"

"I'm _sorry_ Stanley but I cannot help it! I just feel so sad and I see all these visions in my head and hear these voices and I don't know who they are or why I see them!" she cried, her eyes quivering but still not releasing any tears.

"Can you help me, Stanley?"

Stan let out an unnecessary breath as the grip around her neck tightened.

"I've taken the liberty of inviting Sabu here. He should be arriving within a few days," he explained as he finally let his sister go.

But Sandy remained petrified as she took in Stanley's words.

"Sabu…? Him…why?" she asked as she stared at her brother, hurt.

Stan returned her stare defiantly. "As he is the one who turned you, I am hoping him being here will help you find some solace in all this…turmoil you've put yourself through recently."

"I am fine, Stanley!"

Stanley shook his head, offering his hand to her.

"We both know that is not true. Now come, Sandy, you need some sleep."

Hesitantly, and somewhat shamefully, Sandy took his hand and they walked through the corridor.

The last clear memories Sandy had were the seconds before she was turned into a vampire…

It seemed, however, that those memories were now being expanded on…

.

.

_Stanley looked out of the carriage that he and his sister rode in, eyeing the townspeople nervously._

_The city was very populous, and they seemed to be riding through the most overcrowded part of the area. People in ragged, torn clothing were everywhere, begging for money. Some of them were blind, some of them had ten children sitting beside them on the side of the road. None of them looked happy, or safe._

"_I've never been to the capital of the kingdom before, Stanley!" Sandy beamed as she looked at the bustling streets around her, the carriage slowly making its way through the city and towards the King's castle._

"_This city," Stan said, looking out nervously at the dark alleys and how the crowded city suddenly seemed to empty around these alleyways_. _"Is home to those…those creatures!"_

_Sandy seemed to be smiling._

"_Ahh, brother, you do not honestly believe those old wives tales, do you?"_

"_I would not think of them so lightly," he countered as he moved away from the carriage's window. "Father used to swear that he saw one once in this very city!"_

_Now Sandy was laughing openly._

"_Indeed, Stanley! Your gullible behavior will be the death of you!"_

.

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	4. Part IV: Mirrored Flower, Watered Moon 1

**CN**

**Les Nuages de la Perdition**

**Part IV: **_Mirrored Flower, Watered Moon_

**First Act: **_Draconian_

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Seeing her bags on the ground in front of the main gate of the castle, the live-in nurse Stanley had hired for Bijou took a deep breath as she tried to control her rising anger. With pursed lips, she turned to the vampire once again.

"Mr. Tigre," she said as she calmly held out her hands to him, "I cannot leave until I at least examine Miss Ribon and fill out the necessary paperwork."

"Ahh, yes, but as I've told you, I already had a doctor come and visit her," Stanley reminded, staying inside the dark castle while the nurse remained outside the large, iron double-doors that were the main entrance of the castle.

"I was not made aware of this visit," the nurse reminded, annoyed. "And I would like to see the paperwork he filled out, if you don't mind."

It was the early morning. Stanley was obviously losing his temper, and he was quite tired. As his grip tightened so hard on the door that dents formed in the metal, he had no choice but to put on a faux smile and continue.

"I'm sure if you go to the hospital, you will find her paperwork on file," he explained.

"If I could just see her for a few minutes before I leave?" the nurse suggested. "Then I'll leave and you'll never hear from me again!"

"Well, then, here I am," a new voice called from the grand staircase of the foyer.

Stanley turned around and couldn't help but smile out of pride as Bijou, fully dressed in a blue sundress, came down the stairs, smiling at the nurse.

The nurse was amazed. This girl had been on death's door just two days ago! She hadn't been allowed in Bijou's room for the past couple of days, and she was fearing the worst. Yet here she was, with a stunningly white smile on, hair that looked like it had been worked on meticulously in a salon for hours, and clear, white skin that made her look more like a flawless marble statue than a Ham-Human.

_Plus_, the nurse thought enviously, _she seems to have gained weight in all the right places._

Bijou stood by her mate, her hands folded in front of her, as she did her best to give the most sincere smile she could to the nurse.

"Thank you for everything that you've done for me. Truly, I appreciate your hard work," she displayed a beautiful row of perfect white teeth as she smiled.

The nurse was still mesmerized with how her voice sounded so healthy. She didn't know what to say or how to respond, except maybe to ask Bijou what kind of makeup she used.

"No…no problem, I suppose," the nurse added, blinking, almost as if to see if the stunning girl standing before her was a trick of her eyes.

"Will I be needing to fill out any paperwork before you leave?" Bijou asked, raising one of her eyebrows.

"Uhh, no, no, I think I can finish it up when I get back to the hospital," the other woman replied. Bijou tilted her head to the side and smiled, again.

"Have a safe trip," Stan added as he saw the nurse pick up her bags and slowly make her way down the stone path leading to the castle.

"And thank you, once again!" Bijou called; a second later, Stanley slammed the iron door shut.

"_Cherie_," he said hungrily as he leaned against the door, "you look incredible."

"Thank you," she responded as she twirled in the dress, liking the way the fabric moved. "I _feel_ incredible."

As Stanley got a good look at her, however, his eyebrows bunched together in confusion.

"What is it?" Bijou asked, immediately picking up on his puzzled state.

"_Cherie_," he said as he came up to her, putting her face in his hands as he stared at her eyes.

"There are no dark circles under your eyes, and you have not fed yet, either," he realized as he gently stroked the area under her eyes. Indeed, she was wearing no makeup but her face looked flawless, despite the daylight outside. Even Stanley's eyes had faint, but still visible, black rings under his lime green orbs.

Bijou shrugged. "Maybe my body must actually be completely exposed to the sunlight before that happens?"

"Perhaps," Stanley added, looking her body up-and-down. "But you must be famished."

Bijou shrugged again. "In all honesty, Stanley, I've never felt more satiated."

Her mate nodded, albeit slowly. His best guess was that her body was still running on the power one's body was flooded with after it was made vampire. Eventually, she would crash and become very tired and hungry.

"Regardless, we need to get out of these horrid clothes and change back into more appropriate ones," he said as he started unbuttoning his dark blue dress shirt.

"I saw several maids hurrying all throughout the corridors earlier," Bijou explained as she followed him. "They seemed busier than usual."

"Well you _did_ dismiss them while you fell ill, so the entire castle is in dire need of cleaning," Stan reminded. Bijou didn't exactly agree—the castle still looked impeccable—but she supposed her mate was a bit of a perfectionist.

"Also, we are expecting company," Stanley added as he started ascending the staircase.

This news shocked Bijou. "Company? Vampire company?" she assumed since Stanley was going back to dress in his renaissance clothing.

"Mhmm, very important company at that," he told her.

"Well who is it? When are they arriving?"

"His name is Sabu," Stanley started as they power-walked (which was actually a slow pace for them) through the corridors. "He is Sandy's sire."

Bijou could not hide the surprise on her face. "Her sire? I…I had always thought you turned your sister."

"I said I turned _for_ Sandy, never that I actually turned her myself," he reminded with a quick side glance at the white-haired beauty.

"He isn't _your_ sire, is he?" Bijou didn't know much about vampire hierarchy—since she had only met two vampires so far—but Stanley did seem to hold this Sabu in high regards.

"No, Sandy is the one who turned me."

Bijou looked at Stanley, dumbfounded. "Really?"

He nodded just as they came to the door of Stanley's room. They went in and Stanley went straight to his armoire, looking for something that could only have been called "fashion forward" a little over two centuries ago.

"Is Sabu going to help Sandy recover from whatever it is she's going through?" Bijou asked as she sat on Stanley's bed.

Stanley sighed, and Bijou wondered if she could sigh, too. She didn't breathe anymore, after all…

"You live with me and I live with Sandy," Stan reminded as he pulled out a doublet. "You may not understand how hard it is for a vampire to live without his or her maker. I would say it is akin to a child living without their parents. I can only imagine that seeing him would alleviate her troubles somewhat." Bijou fell into a slight depression at hearing these words.

"As for your other question," Stanley added before Bijou could get another word in, "according to Sabu's letter, he should be arriving in a couple of days."

"How long has it been since Sandy's seen him?"

"Ten, maybe eleven years?" he guessed. Years seemed to blend together so easily.

_A long time to be away from your parents…_

"I hope everything works out for Sandy," Bijou said softly as she looked to the side, where a bit of faint sunlight was peeking through the black curtains of Stanley's room.

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The morning of the day Sabu was expected to arrive, Bijou was rather surprised when, upon waking, she saw Stanley standing at the foot of her bed.

Bijou realized he was wearing a sleeveless black turtleneck and matching black pants.

_Funny_, she thought lazily as she rubbed the tired out of her eyes, _he made such a big deal about wearing 'modern' clothes as infrequently as possible._

"Get dressed," he told her somewhat briskly. Bijou looked down at her sheets and saw something that wasn't her usual ball gown laid out in front of her.

"What are we doing at this unholy hour, Stanley?" she asked as she picked up her outfit. It was some sort of stretchy material.

"_Cherie_," Stanley explained, "today we will draw out your power."

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If Bijou were still a human, she would've been shivering at this early hour. Winter had yet to pass and the trees around them were still bare.

Not unlike Bijou's attire.

Stanley had given her a purple, form-fitting halter dress and with it a brown belt that was too big so it slanted and rested on her hip. She had on brown, very durable army boots that buckled up to her calves.

"I'm not sure what your power is," Stanley said as they reached a clearing in the castle's forest. "Sandy and I realized our powers just moments after being turned, yet you have not."

Bijou frowned. She had no idea she was expected to develop her power so quickly.

"I have a theory," Stanley continued. "Your power most likely isn't defensive, like mine. Your power is probably an offensive attack, and the reason you have not developed it yet is because you have yet to be provoked."

He clapped his hands, which were covered in black gloves, and looked at Bijou.

"So you're going to attack me?" Bijou said nervously.

Stanley stared at her for a moment. The nervousness was very evident on her face, as was her frustration this morning when he told her to get up, now that he thought about it. She had been a vampire for a few days at this point, and he was expecting her to have lost some of her more human characteristics, especially her emotions.

"_Cherie_," he started as he flashed in front of her, holding her little face in his hands. Bijou blinked at him expectantly.

"Do you remember what I told you when I first brought you to this castle?"

Bijou nodded. "You said that my vision of you is clouded, but soon you would help me see you as something far more beautiful."

Stanley's eyes lowered. "Very good, _Cherie_…and look how far we've come," he said as he turned around.

_She still has her human memories…_

"So you really are going to attack me?" Bijou asked again to his back. Stanley turned around and nodded.

"I obviously will not hurt you, _Cherie_, but I will try to make your body activate its best defense mechanisms, which, if my theory is correct, is your offensive power."

Bijou glanced to the side uneasily, "Umm, o-"

Before her eyes shifted back to Stanley, he was lunging at her with lightning fast speed.

Completely taken by surprise, Bijou was left petrified as he forcefully smashed her body against a tree behind her, pinning her by her neck. The strength he used was enough to normally crush the neck vertebrae of a regular person. _She has strength_,though that was a given.

"_Cherie_," he said, not looking at her eyes but rather scanning her body, "I was expecting you to dodge."

"You were so fast!" she complained. Stanley's eyes keep darting all around her, and Bijou realized why her attire was so minimal.

He was examining every exposed cell of her body for any sort of supernatural sign—a glowing symbol, a deformation of her body—anything at all. He truly was judging how her body was reacting.

"That was not my full speed, _Cherie_," he said, voice eerily low, as he turned around, telling her that she should've been able to keep up at this point. He pulled his gloves down even more on his wrist, tightening them.

Bijou looked down. Her back was still pressed against the tree, but Stanley was yards away from her. She felt like she was disappointing him. What did it feel like, she wondered, to create a vampire with no power? She kept her eyes focused on the woodchips and rocks at her feet instead of his back.

"Stop it," he told her, his back still to her. _Stop being able to feel depressed._

Bijou looked up, face riddled with doe-like innocence.

Stan finally turned around, his hand over his mouth as he thought.

"Why don't you show me how fast you can go?"

Bijou could flash through the castle, yes, but she had never been asked to show how fast she could move. Though, she supposed this was something Stanley would naturally be curious about, as her maker and everything.

"Alright," she agreed. She kept her hands at her side but fisted them, looking at the small clearing between them. _Just focus…_

She moved forward, willing herself to move as fast as her supernatural body could. And although her current speed would be close to that of a car at full-speed, it was still too slow for a newborn vampire.

A split-second later, Stan had her pinned on the ground. As he straddled her, she could see frustration all over his features.

"I'm sorry," Bijou squeaked. "I thought…I thought I was going really fast!"

"Perhaps you need a few more days of rest," Stan thought aloud. His eyes looked dull as he realized that she was, truthfully, very weak. "Alright, _Cherie—"_

Stan was cutoff when Bijou punched the right side of his face, causing him to fly off her somewhere to her right a few meters away. He hit a tree and dented it.

With his back still slumped against the tree's trunk, he immediately saw Bijou in front of him, pressing her brown boot into his chest.

"Perhaps," she agreed, "but I do know that I am a fast learner."

Stanley was impressed. He was so much older than her but she had managed to physically assault him. He knew his mate wouldn't disappoint him.

And that's when he saw them.

There, like black clouds spotting the gray sky. Two of them were flying around in a circle, displaying their pincer-like teeth and whip tails with obvious hunger surrounding their every move. The massive pterodactyls Bijou had somehow conjured up in the dungeon had returned, and they seemed to be after Stanley again.

"What?" Bijou asked, looking to the sky to see what her mate was so intent on gazing at. Stanley realized that when she looked to the sky, all he sensed from her was confusion.

"What are you looking at?" Bijou asked again, this time turning to Stanley. She moved her foot off his chest and let him get back up.

He immediately flashed to her side, watching, in awe, as the monsters slowly started to fade away. It was incredible how such massive creatures could disappear into nothingness so quickly.

Her power, Stanley realized as the ominous thought hit him, was protecting herself via those hideous creatures. They were the most offensive, powerful, and brilliant defense mechanism, and she had no idea she had them.

Bijou was still looking at him expectantly. As he turned to her, he gave her a genuine smile.

"You are incredible, _Cherie_," he said at length, turning to her, eyes widened.

"Thank you…" Bijou was confused. One minute, he was disappointed in her, the next, he was praising her.

"That's enough practice for today," Stanley concluded as he once again looked at the sky, making sure nothing unnatural was there. With his hand holding onto hers, Bijou barely had enough time to register his words before they were headed back to the castle.

.

.

From her window, Sandy had seen Stanley take Bijou into the forest. She walked away from her crimson curtains, slouching as she collapsed on her bed. How many days had it been since Stanley told her that Sabu was visiting? Time was moving desperately slow for her, yet it was still too much for her to catch up.

She had seen her reflection a couple of days ago. It looked like she had black paint smeared under her eyes, when in reality she was just so excruciatingly tired. She had a bed, none of the maids had bothered her in the past few days, so she had all the peace and quiet she desired.

Yet there was a very good reason why sleep had been so unattainable for her lately.

It seemed as though every time she closed her eyes, she could remember them—the people, the voices, their names—it all circled around her, waiting to attack her when she least suspected it. And she had no idea if these were memories or manipulated bits of nothing, but either way, as she fell down on her pillow, the scenery came back.

The words Sandy would use to describe this castle from the outside now and over 250 years ago were_ how_ _beautiful…_

"—_wouldn't you agree, Stanley?" Sandy asked, pressing her face against the carriage's glass._

"_Hmm, what did you say, Sandy?"_

_Stanley looked up at the hill. The carriage was moving closer and closer, but the gray castle never seemed to grow smaller. He looked away, feigning disinterest. _

"_The king of France lives here," Sandy sighed dreamily._ _"I was merely stating how beautiful I thought the castle looked—and I bet it looks far lovelier from the inside!"_

"_We're only here on a short visit," Stan reminded her as the carriage moved into the castle's main gates. "I do not plan on making this an extended stay, and besides…"_

_Stan looked at the gray sky around them, this eerily blank sheet that this region of France was infamous for. "…I much rather prefer the sunlight…"_

_Sandy fisted her small, peachy hands. "Brother…" She kept her eyes down as she bit her lip._

_Stanley immediately realized that something was wrong. "What? Are you ok? We can turn this carriage around this instant if that is what you wish—"_

_Sandy shook her head just as their vehicle stopped moving._

"_Stanley, I…I don't think it's so horrible wanting to live the life of a Queen. Maybe living in this castle for the rest of my life is my destiny? And I really do not want to be a burden on you…"_

"_You're not a burden, not in any sense," he cut in, not wanting to hear another word. "You are my sister and it is therefore my God-given right to take care of you."_

"_Yes, I am your sister," she agreed. "It is therefore my job to find a suitable man to live with for the rest of my life so you need not worry, and who better than The King?" she asked. _

_Stan's eyes softened as he grabbed her hands. "Although I dread the day a young man will come and take you away from me, that day will eventually come, and he will be a man that you truly love, not marry out of worry."_

_Sandy looked at her brother, astonished by how far he would go for her. "Stanley…!"_

"_Now," Stan said as he squeezed her hands, "let's go tell His Majesty that you are just not interested, ok?"_

_._

"_It's absolutely abysmal in here," Stanley quickly whispered into his sister's ear as they looked around at the gray stone walls. Their mansion was so much more open and earthy. This palace seemed more akin to a jail cell than a place of royalty._

"_Shh, Stanley!" Sandy cried, though she could not hide the smile on her face. It truly was dreary…Though quite a sight from the outside._

_The two of them were led into the throne room where they waited patiently._

"_It's rather drafty in here as well," Stan said as he shivered. Sandy sighed._

"_Stanley you will have us beheaded due to your complaints! We should be grateful His Majesty invited us to his castle!"_

"_Ahh, but the pleasure is all mine," said a crisp voice from somewhere above._

_The two Tigre twins watched as a man with gray hair and matching beard descended from the main staircase. His wrinkled face positively lit up at the sight of Sandy. On either side of him were two guards, flanking both his sides lest he miss a step._

"_Your Majesty," Stanley said, quickly bowing as Sandy did a curtsy. She, however, could not help but want to take another look at him, even when all her etiquette lessons told her to keep her head lowered. While she had never met The King in person, she knew he was old, but this man could've been her father, perhaps even her grandfather!_

"_Duke Tigre, Lady Sandra, you may rise," the man offered as he sat on his throne, his guards positioning themselves on either side of him._

_As the two of them straightened up, they realized the king had his eyes on Sandy the entire time._

"_Your beauty is legendary, My Lady," he drawled out as he leaned on his elbow, happily watching her. "And in reality, the rumors do you no justice. You are far superior to any story's description I've heard."_

"_Ah, thank you, Your Majesty," Sandy said, flustered, as she did another curtsy. "You are far too kind."_

"_Your Majesty," Stan quickly cut in, eyeing his sister through his periphery, "My father left some documents regarding the recent drought affecting the North. It seems he devised a plan to stabilize the economy despite the lack of exporting. I would like to discuss it with you in far more detail, in private."_

_Stan knew he was risking something, but he had no choice as he saw the older man's lecherous grin. He was never good at reading emotions, but even so, he had an idea that the king wasn't relatively pleased at this sudden proposal. The royal before them believed they had come here to accept his proposal to Sandy, not do any sort of business._

"_Your father was quite the genius," The King said finally, looking at Stan as if observing a child. "He always made haste with overcoming any financial woe that came over this kingdom."_

_Sandy remained still, secretly hoping The King would agree to speak to her brother immediately._

_Stan waited, but finally The King sighed and agreed, "I suppose we may speak for a short while. Maids, please lead Duke Tigre to my study and Lady Sandra to her chamber." With a snap of his fingers, two maids came rushing out, one of whom beckoned Stanley to follow her while the other led Sandy in the opposite direction._

_The Tigre twins glanced at each other longingly as they parted ways, and all the while The King kept his gaze on the striking young beauty._

_._

_._

_Sandy sat on her bed, nervously picking at the crimson sheets as she watched the maids bring in her luggage. They started unpacking her belongings and setting them up all across her room, and she couldn't help but wonder how long they thought she was going to stay here._

"_You don't need to do that," she said at length, "for I won't be here longer than a few days."_

_The two maids who were currently attending to her exchanged glances. _

"_Excuse us, Lady Sandra," one of them said, "but we were under the impression that you were to be His Majesty's new wife."_

_Sandy looked to the side. "…I'm…" She did not want to let the maids know that she had no sincere intention of marrying The King, but this was something either she or her brother had to tell the ruler himself._

_Thankfully, another maid came in with the perfect change of subject for Sandy. This new maid started hanging bundles of garlic from Sandy's windows, and she also put little crosses all over the gray-and-red room._

"_I would think flowers made for a far better scent," she joked as she stood up and looked at the bundles of garlic. The three maids glanced at her, resisting the urge to roll their eyes, as they continued what they were doing._

_Sandy could sense the tension in the room, and being a very carefree girl, this did not sit well with her. "So…what are these for, anyway?" she asked, gently flitting her fingers over the garlic cloves._

"_They're to protect you from the monsters that populate this area," one of the maids finally explained. She briskly walked past Sandy and started adjusting the pillows on the girl's bed._

"_So they exist?" Sandy's eyes widened. She owed her brother an apology then, for he was afraid of these creatures and she often poked fun at him for it, believing them to be made-up. _

_The maids were not fond of the aristocracy, only because it was well known that the vampires in the area liked to feed on noble blood. Having the Tigre twins in the palace, as well as having been assigned to Lady Sandra, was a threat to their very lives. Currently, the bright-eyed duchess was not one of their favorite people in the world._

"_Can you tell me more about them?" Sandy asked, but she received no answer in return. The maids continued to push past her and do their work, making it a point to brush past her roughly._

_The duchess blinked a few times, wondering what she had done to upset these women. Feeling a little dejected, Sandy merely asked, "I heard The King's library is quite extraordinary. May I see it?"_

"_It's not too far from this wing," one of the maids answered quickly. "Just walk south along the corridors and when you reach the main dining hall, ask a guard how to proceed."_

_Sandy was expecting one of the maids to take her, but she smiled nevertheless. "Alright, thank you…" And with those vague directions, she was off._

.

.

Bijou stepped away from Sandy, admiring her work. The older vampire's hair had been done up, though Bijou hadn't done that (Sandy was vehement about anyone else touching her hair). But Bijou _had_ done Sandy's make up, eliminating the dark black circles that she had under her eyes momentarily and adding some color to her otherwise pale cheeks.

"You look beautiful, Sandy," Bijou beamed. Sandy looked away.

"Do you know when he's arriving?" Bijou asked, but Sandy got off the bed and looked outside at the blackness of the sky.

"He'll be arriving within the hour…perhaps less than half an hour," she said as she stepped away from the curtains.

"You can sense him?"

Sandy nodded, "Only because we've been separated for so long…"

"Stan told me Sabu normally travels with a convoy of other vampires, but he'll be travelling alone this time," she said, trying to make small-talk with Sandy.

"Relatively alone," Sandy corrected. "He always travels with his mate." Sandy's eyes lowered, her sullen disposition clashing horribly with her beautiful face.

"You told me that the only feelings a vampire could have were lust and hatred, but you obviously feel lonely without him," Bijou thought aloud.

"I said those were the only feelings a vampire had _with ease_. Surely you cannot think this is easy for me," Sandy somewhat hissed, her eyes looking over at her desk where the maids arranged her trinkets over two-and-a-half centuries ago.

"I'm sorry," Bijou spoke softly, flashing to Sandy and placing her frigid fingers on the girl's arm, alerting the lime-eyed vampire and breaking her out of her reverie. "Why don't we go see Stanley now?"

.

.

Sandy's blood-red gown rustled as she slowly followed Bijou down the corridors. Sandy had asked to walk rather than flash, and Bijou empathically agreed.

Although Sandy rather liked the feeling of being cared for, she felt like a child every time Bijou looked over her shoulder and at the vampire.

When Stanley finally met them in the hallway, he gave an all too patronizing look to Sandy as he quickly whispered something to Bijou so quietly that even Sandy's supernatural hearing could not detect it. Bijou looked at Stanley and nodded, and all the while, the three of them kept walking down the corridor to the main lobby.

Sandy was not fond of this. She much rather preferred the days when she or Stanley were leading a silent, depressed Bijou down the hallways and she and her brother were the ones having the esoteric conversations. She was normal then, a mere few months ago.

When they finally reached the entry to the castle, Sandy looked to her left, half-expecting to see a throne there, but there was none. Perhaps these "memories" she kept seeing were, in fact, just hallucinations.

"Is he any closer now?"

Sandy glared at Bijou—her overly-caring smile, her soft voice, the way her eyes pitied her.

She walked away from the two mates, sighing as she concentrated on the venom of her sire, running deep, deep within her veins.

"Probably ten minutes," she said acidly.

Stanley nodded and walked to the other side of the entrance. With another reassuring pat on her shoulder, Bijou went to join him, and the two of them immediately exchanged some information, always keeping their eyes on Sandy.

"…but you want her to leave the castle!" Bijou cried, careful so that the green-eyed beauty would not hear.

"Some time spent away travelling with her maker may restore her sanity, _Cherie_," he reminded. "I only have her best interests at heart."

Bijou paused. "I suppose…she might even find her mate while she is away, oh but Stanley, I don't want her to go!"

"It'll be fine, _Cherie_. We might finally get some time to ourselves," Stan added with a suggestive look.

His mate thought about this concept for a while. She had lived with both Stan and Sandy since she had arrived at this castle. She had forgotten about life outside these gray walls and one without these two vampires.

"We could travel," Stanley said, "Or we could stay in France—really, _Cherie_, we have an eternity to do whatever it is we desire."

Bijou's eyes softened as she walked away from Stanley, wringing her hands nervously. "Eternity, forever, they are such indefinable words—"

"Until you realize you have too much time and that eternity and forever are two fearsome concepts," Sandy finished from the other side of the lobby.

Stanley rolled his eyes. His sister seemed keen on ruining the mood. But Bijou could feel nothing but a tragic pain in her chest as she watched Sandy suffer.

And perhaps not a moment too soon, the two iron doors that made up the front gate swung open.

If Bijou was not amazed with the vampire—or vampires, really—she would've laughed at the almost comical mood of the setting. The dark sky cast the perfect silhouette of the man as he walked into the castle, acting as if he owned it. He exuded the type of pompousness that made Stanley seem modest, and behind him followed, well…his polar opposite.

"Can't take care of your own sister without me, can you?" he asked in a gruff voice, letting the candlelight of the castle finally cast its glow upon him. Bijou tensed for some unknown reason as she saw him and the vampire he had with him.

He had gray, spiky hair. Bijou wasn't sure if he was just old when he was turned or if his natural hair color was gray. He wore an eye patch across his left eye. Like Stanley, he wore a black doublet more akin to a lute player than a man living in the twenty-first century. And on his arm, there was a girl who Bijou assumed was French. She had white hair, just like Bijou, and wore a white, feathery gown that fell to the floor. This girl was pretty (she was a vampire after all), though she seemed to be a little young, perhaps in her early adulthood, and the sharp features of her face seemed more like a bird than a Ham-Human. She kept her eyes downcast.

"Sabu," Stanley said, flashing before the vampire, "Thank you for coming with such short notice."

"Hn." Sabu walked around Stanley, his "date" gliding with him as he moved. He stopped directly in front of Sandy who had gone rigid the second the doors had opened.

"Sandy," he huffed out. Bijou stared from Sabu to Sandy and back to Sabu again, worriedly noticing how Sandy was letting out small, nervous noises.

For a few seconds, everything went silent as Sandy, fists clenched, just stared at her maker who was somewhat smirking.

Everything changed, however, when Sandy ran into him. The girl on Sabu's arm seemed to move away, knowing not to interfere. Sabu immediately embraced Sandy, putting his chin on top of her head as she sobbed (though without shedding a single tear) into his chest. His arms folded across her back and he seemed to be whispering to her, trying to lull her into a state of calm.

_Amazing…_ Bijou was shocked at how deep this connection was. Had she not known better, she would've assumed the two of them were mates. Though their embrace really did seem like that of a parent and their child. She looked at Stanley and wondered if this is what would happen if she ever had to leave his side.

"There, there, Sandy," Sabu soothed as he stroked Sandy's blonde locks. "It will all be better now."

Sandy seemed to let out a deeper cry as she grabbed onto the back of his shirt, and while all this happened, Sabu turned his attention to the youngest vampire in the room.

He did not need Stanley's power to figure out how nervous and hesitant Bijou felt at that moment. In all his years, he realized that instant, he had never met a vampire quite like her before.

.

.

Stanley and Bijou walked in-step as they led the three other vampires into the main dining area. Sabu followed behind them with Sandy latched onto his arm like a tired child, and the white-haired vampire that came in with Sabu walked behind everyone else.

They walked slowly, as Sandy was in no mood to use her powers, but Bijou honestly wished she could just run away. She could feel Sabu's eyes on the back of her head, and she couldn't understand why, but the vampire already had developed some sort of disdain for her. Whenever she turned her head to check on Sandy, Sabu was glaring at Bijou.

She let out an unnecessary breath and kept walking, her head held high. He was here for Sandy and she had to keep that in mind.

When they entered the main dining hall, where Bijou and Stan had had their first dinner, a maid was standing at the foot of the massive table while holding a tray of golden chalices.

The maid was petrified as the five vampires approached her, each taking a glass of blood. After all the vampires took their cups, the maid quickly scurried away. Sabu seemed to drink his cup immediately while Sandy took a few, short sips. Stan almost seemed to be in competition with Sabu, for when the gray-haired vampire downed his glass, Stanley immediately finished his in one gulp. The French vampire that had come with Sabu took her cup and walked around the room, idly observing the tapestries as she took her sips.

Bijou just stared as the cup in her hands, debating actually drinking this liquid tissue of a living being. The liquid was so shiny that she could actually see her reflection in its maroon tide.

"_Cherie_," Stanley was immediately by her side, egging her on. "I know you've never tasted blood from another creature before, but really, you have yet to feed."

Bijou looked at the drink again and then at Stanley, innocently asking him with her eyes, "Do I have to?"

"A new vampire needs to feed far more often than a vampire of Stanley's age does," Sabu told Bijou, patting Sandy's shoulder as he momentarily stepped away from her. "How old is she—five days? She should've consumed the blood amount of a small chicken by now." He looked at Stan, almost scolding him for not properly taking care of the baby vampire. Stanley started to say something, but his mate fiercely spoke up.

"Stanley has asked me frequently if I needed any sort of sustenance, and _I_ have always been the one to tell him that I am quite satisfied," Bijou explained, returning the glare Sabu was giving her earlier. How dare this man enter Stanley's castle and accuse him of mistreatment!

Sabu arched an eyebrow, almost amused at this new being. Stanley beamed as Bijou turned her head in a whip-like fashion and promptly took a sip of the drink.

Even the bird-like vampire across the room looked on in curiosity as the liquid travelled down Bijou's throat for the first time. Bijou immediately pulled the chalice away from her as she grabbed her stomach, sure that she would just regurgitate all that she had just consumed. It was so metallic, so vile and it slithered down her throat like it had its own mind. However, just a mere second later, she suddenly felt a wave of energy. She could suddenly smell the liquid, beckoning her for another sip. She knew she had to refuse; she knew this was wrong, but she desperately needed more.

With monstrous speed, she crushed the chalice against her lips and gulped, over and over and over again. She hadn't been thirsty at all a few moments earlier, but all she wanted was more and more blood. It was like she had been starved for decades. When it was all gone, she probed her tongue all over the cup, desperate for a few more drops.

Stanley was incredibly proud of his little mate. She gripped her chalice longingly, looking at its emptiness and feeling incredibly unsatisfied on the inside.

Sandy looked away, something that only Sabu seemed to notice.

"Do you want some more, _Cherie_?" Stan asked as lovingly as Bijou had ever heard him speak to her. s

Bijou's first instincts were to scream yes—she was half-ready to attack the maids that were just a few rooms away…

"No, thank you, Stanley," she spoke slowly, crushing the chalice in her hands. She had to have control. Even _Stan_ had control over his feedings. The other white-haired vampire was immediately at her side, leading her to the dining table; she pulled out a chair and sat Bijou down.

"It is wise not to drink too much your first time, anyway," she assured. Bijou looked at the girl. She had gray eyes. They reminded Bijou of the sky.

"Who are you?" Bijou's sudden hunger made her words come out more harshly than necessary.

The gray-eyed vampire straightened her posture. "I am Francoise, Sabu's mate."

"Francoise was just turned a couple of decades ago," Stan explained as he appeared on the other side of Bijou. "Her memories of being turned and being a newborn vampire are relatively new compared to ours."

Bijou took another unnecessary breath. She turned to her side. "Thank you," she spoke genuinely to Francoise.

"Francoise has a very powerful gift," Sabu said as he and Sandy stepped behind Francoise's chair. "As long as she is touching your palm, she can see your future."

Bijou's hunger was suddenly forgotten as she turned excitedly to the girl. "Really?"

Francoise looked bored, a stark contrast to Bijou's enthusiasm. "A flash of one second into your future is trivial compared to an eternity of existing."

"I still wanna know my future!" Bijou turned to Stan happily, and he simply shrugged, though he was careful not to catch Sabu's eyes as this was going on.

With superhuman speed, Francoise picked up Bijou's right hand. She held up the palm to her face, pressing her ice-cold thumb into Bijou's skin.

Bijou didn't feel anything out of the ordinary, but she was amazed when Francoise's eyes suddenly widened—going completely gray, even the pupils.

Bijou blinked and quickly looked at Stan, but his nod assured her that everything was normal.

The seconds passed, almost turning into a full minute. Bijou briefly wondered how long the other vampire had to be holding her hand, and was about to ask how lengthy this process was before Francoise actually said anything, but before she could speak, Francoise shuddered frantically.

Her nails dug into Bijou's hand—she almost looked like she was having a seizure. Bijou tried pulling away, but the other vampire's grip was too strong. Bijou looked at Stan worriedly. However, before any vampire in the room could do anything about it, Francoise let out a cry.

She immediately jerked her hands away from Bijou, taking a sudden, sharp breath as she backed away from the girl, knocking her chair off the ground in the process.

"What happened?" Sabu was instantly at her side. He grabbed her elbows and she immediately looked at him, her mouth falling open.

As her eyes returned to normal, she looked from her mate to Bijou. "I…it was…bizarre."

Bijou was now standing, though she kept a cautious distant from the clairvoyant vampire.

"How so?" Sabu was now looking at Bijou, standing between Sandy and Stanley.

"It was my longest vision yet," she started. She was now also looking at Bijou. "I suppose that's why I was so frightened. I had never seen one that long—or so powerful. I can normally control how much of one's future I see, but this vision kept coming and coming and wouldn't stop."

"So the vision itself wasn't anything abnormal?" Stanley asked. Francoise gave Stan a grave look.

"Bijou was watching television. She was standing behind a couch—but she looked incredibly sad. She was grabbing the couch for support."

"That sounds like the game room," Sandy said softly, voice barely audible. Bijou tilted her head.

"There's a game room in this castle?" Bijou was stunned. This time, Stan spoke.

"You weren't previously allowed in, _Cherie_, due to the fact that there are phones and a television in that room, as well as a computer," he added.

"Why was I so sad?" Bijou looked at every vampire in the room, but none of them returned her stare. Francoise, though, while looking to the side, shrugged.

"You should know," she started, her eyes flitting back and forth, revealing the inner war she was fighting over whether this information should be revealed.

"Know what?" Bijou asked, moving forward half a step; Francoise moved a step back.

"You…" She pursed her lips, looking at the girl with cautious eyes.

"You were crying," she finally finished, causing all four pairs of eyes to suddenly move to her.

The scrutiny in the room was almost tangible, Stan realized. He had no idea what to do—if Francoise's vision was accurate, as all her others were, then his little mate was not a normal vampire. Crying was just not something vampires could do! At the same time, she was still his mate and he could not watch her be judged so easily.

Sandy's eyes shook, almost looking jealously at Bijou.

Sabu lowered his eyes and hugged his mate close to his side. Stan had found quite an interesting girl, that much had become obvious in the span of less than an hour. These next few days promised to be interesting.

Bijou was so confused; everyone suddenly took a small step away from her, as if she was a disease—but no one was giving her any sort of answers as to why this behavior abruptly started!

"Well…how far in advance are these visions? Do you know?"

Again, silence, but this time everyone shifted their eyes immediately. Even Stanley kept his head turned, not even looking at her though he could sense her rising distress.

Bijou felt her eyes shake. Stan, feeling her depression, wondered if she would cry now.

With a deep exhale, she pushed past Stan and flashed to the end of the dining room, giving the rest of the vampires a glare before opening the grand wooden doors and flashing into the hallway.

Once in the hallway, she decided to walk instead of using her powers. She needed some time to clear her head.

It wasn't fair! She had no control over what Francoise saw, but everyone in there was acting as if she had done something wrong! And to add to that, what was so wrong if the vision showed her being upset and crying—surely that was no reason to punish and ignore her!

She clenched her fists and kept walking. What was going on? Why couldn't they tell her what made them go so quiet that her own mate wasn't answering her…or following her, Bijou realized as she looked over her shoulder.

Her footsteps gave away how angered she was. As she marched through the ancient halls, her silver-and-white gown clutched in her hands, she didn't realize—she couldn't have—that Sandy had once stormed through these very halls, feeling the same sort of indignation…

Bijou pursed her lips together tightly. "How dare they! How am I _at fault…They wouldn't even answer me!" _

_Sandy could not understand it. The maids were ignoring her, all because she asked about the vampires. But in all honesty, who wouldn't ask? It was such an intriguing concept in and of itself. Surely they had been questioned about it before! _

_That was half the reason she was going to the library. She wanted to see if there were any books in The King's collection that could give her some more information about these creatures. The other half of it was: she really had heard amazing things about this library and wanted to see its grandeur for herself._

_After asking a guard in the hallway, she was directed to a corridor where a pair of massive doors stood. It was eerily quiet in this hallway. Everything seemed so still. Even the dust moved in an almost gelatinous fashion. Shifting her eyes a little, she continued down anyway._

_It took some effort, but she got the double doors opened and her eyes widened._

_It was a stunning sight! With beautiful, stained-glass panes lined on both sides, the light came into the room in a gorgeous gradient, hitting the shelves, filled with every book imaginable, with every color imaginable. It truly was quiet for such a beautiful room. She'd stay here just for the view!_

_She moved forward, unsure of where to start. Should she look under "Creatures of the Kingdom" or maybe "Mysteries in the Land of the Monarch"? _

_Sandy darted through the aisles, her eyes quickly taking in whatever was listed on the spines of these books. She let out a frustrated sigh with each and every aisle she passed through without success. The disappointing thought occurred to her more than once: What if there were no books about these monsters?_

_She had almost cleared all the aisles when she finally saw a tome at the very top of the medical maladies shelf._

"'_The Blood-Drinkers and Their Plague,'" she read, smiling in excitement. Unfortunately for her, however, the book was on the topmost shelf. That wouldn't ordinarily be a problem, for she was used to climbing high shelves since she was a child (her mother would often scold her for being unable to sit in one place)._

_So without bothering to look for a stool or ladder or some kind, Sandy bunched her gown in one of her hands and grabbed the bookshelves with the other. With expert ease she managed to get to the top and grab the book with the forest green cover._

_Sandy held onto the book with one hand and remained in her elevated position as she balanced the book between her bust and the shelf, eagerly reading as much as she could._

"_What are you doing?"_

_She hadn't expected to hear anyone else in the library, let alone in such an angered voice. She was so taken by surprise that in her attempt to look down at who was speaking, she lost her balance and fell._

_The shelves were tall. She had to have been a good six feet off the ground, which wasn't much for a fall but she was still expecting to hit something hard. Instead, she found herself on something soft and fleshy._

_Sandy let out a worried squeal as she quickly scurried off the man. She tossed the book aside for a second and kneeled on her knees, sitting the Ham-Human she had just fallen on right-side-up. _

"_I am so, so, so very sorry!" she exclaimed. His breathing was a little shallow. At least he seemed ok, but she couldn't tell from his expression since his face was lowered, his chestnut locks blocking his entire visage. _

_And then, suddenly, the man jerked his hand away from Sandy's worried grip._

"_What, pray tell, were you doing?"He asked, looking up at Sandy for the first time._

_For a second, there was nothing but silence as the two stared at each other._

_She forgot how angered the man's words seemed as she stared at his eyes. They were so blue—like nothing she had ever seen before. Like the clearest summer sky she had ever seen. She didn't know that the man was likewise looking at her eyes, never having seen such a vivid lime shade. And her strawberry-blonde hair! It seemed to bring out the little flecks of gold in her eyes perfectly…_

_The two realized they were staring at each other and quickly looked away. _

_The man coughed. He got up and offered his hand to Sandy, who happily took it._

"_I'm sorry," Sandy said again, taking her hand back. "I was just really so interested in that book…oh!" she cried as she ran over and picked it up, lovingly looking at it._

"_Is that how you treat books you like?" _

_Sandy looked up when she realized he had a sharp edge in his voice. He clearly cared about these ancient texts. _

"_Well, I only threw it down in order to help you up," Sandy reminded, voice hurt._

_The man, who couldn't have been more than a year or so older than Sandy, suddenly blushed._

"_I'm sorry, that was uncalled for." He couldn't understand why seeing her hurt had made him feel so insecure. He coughed again and looked down._

"_Are you hurt?"_

_He shook his head. All the while, he was trying to figure out who this girl was. She was dressed far too nicely to be a relative or friend of the maids, and he immediately dismissed the thought of her being from an aristocratic family—those girls hardly knew how to read._

"_Well, if it weren't for you breaking my fall, I would be the one to surely be hurt," Sandy reminded. "So, thank you."_

_A small blush crept onto the man's face as he watched Sandy do a swift curtsy before him. As she rose, she gave him one of her legendarily infectious smiles. _

"_May I ask the name of my savior?" She asked softly. She stepped forward, and he stepped back. Unbeknownst to her, this was one of the longest conversations he had ever had with a girl._

"_M-Maxwell," he said, unsure of why he was so nervous all of a sudden. All she asked was his name! "Maxwell Li-Librius. I am…I am the Official Researcher for His Majesty."_

"_Maxwell," she repeated, liking the feeling of the word on her lips, "What sort of research?"_

"_Well," he stopped and thought, "anything His Majesty desires, really. Mostly financial records and income reports, but it all depends."_

"_Then you must spend a lot of time in the library," she thought aloud. "I must admit, I envy that."_

"_R-really?" A girl saying she liked being in the library? Maxwell had honestly never heard of such a thing!_

"_Yes, I quite like the atmosphere in a library. It's so very calming—I would spend all my time in my own library back home if I hadn't already read all the books, and of course, my mother did not send me to all those horrid etiquette classes instead. But my father's library is not even a tenth of this size…" she mused as she looked around._

"_And where is your home?" Maxwell's curiosity was now thoroughly piqued._

_Sandy looked back at him and her eyes widened. "I've completely forgotten my manners!" She straightened up, her book still in one of her hands, and placed her free hand on her chest._

"_I am Sandra Tigre," she enlightened, hoping she had the grace and elegance her mother had when she was introducing herself._

_But as soon as Maxwell heard these words, he stepped back, a look of shock coming onto his face. He should've known that a girl like her was too good to be true._

"_You're Lady Sandra…His Majesty's new fiancée!" he reminded her, continuing to move away from her._

"_I…well, no, I haven't agreed to it, yet-"_

"_Yet," Maxwell repeated as he turned around and ran down one of the aisles._

"_Wait!" Sandy cried, trying to follow him. However, he had rounded the corner and had disappeared into some sort of corridor attached to the library._

_Sandy's shoulders slouched as she dejectedly turned around. Her steps were sluggish as she moved, wondering, _Did I do something wrong?

Wrong, this was wrong. Sandy had to keep reminding herself of this fact as her head fell into her hands.

"Are you tired, Sandy?" Sabu asked from somewhere on her left. "Stan informed me that you have not been sleeping well."

Sandy took a second to push all those names and hallucinations away before she looked at her maker.

"I am," she admitted. She looked around and saw Francoise seated across from her, but nobody else in the room.

"Where are my brother and Bijou?" Sandy finally asked. Sabu raised an eyebrow at her.

"Your brother's mate ran off in a bit of a fury, and he went out to find her just a moment ago. You don't remember, Sandy?" he was now stroking her hair very, very gently. It had to be handled very carefully, after all.

Sandy tried. Yes, now that she focused on it, Bijou _did_ get mad and leave. She then sullenly realized that she had been too absorbed in her memories—no, they were just hallucinations, _yes_—to have noticed her brother's departure.

"The newborn," Sabu started. Sandy looked at him, thankful for the change in subject.

"Bijou," Sandy reminded.

"Yes, well, she's an odd one, isn't she?" Sabu asked. Francoise nodded to herself while Sandy shrugged.

"She can be, but every vampire is different," Sandy said.

"She can still feel human emotions," Sabu said, almost icily, as he tapped his fingers against the dining table. "And according to Francoise's vision, she'll be able to do so in the future, as well."

"It is not all that bizarre," Sandy lied. "You all overreacted."

"She has her human memories…But she has no powers," Sabu said quietly. "Stanley told me that in his letter a few days ago."

This had Sandy a little perplexed. Every vampire had some sort of power. Now that she thought about, Stanley had mentioned nothing. Though, he could've been refraining from talking about Bijou's powers around Sandy since Sandy was in such a fragile state these days.

"Bijou did not originally plan on ever becoming a vampire," she said, almost reminding herself.

"Ahh, but neither did you, Sandy," Sabu explained. Sandy's eyes immediately went to him, as did Francoise's, for the turning of Sandy and her past was a forbidden topic for him to speak of.

"What I mean to say is," he started again, careful to avoid the topic of her days as a human, "is that nobody plans on becoming like us when they are still human. When the opportunity presents itself, however…"

He looked at Francoise, then back at Sandy.

"…we all make the right choice."

.

.

Bijou grabbed the corner of the corridor for support. Why was her vision suddenly going blurry? And why was she so weak? One minute she had been walking through the castle, and the next she was fighting a sharp pain in her head.

"_Oh_!" she cried as she collapsed on her knees, clutching her stomach where a new pain erupted. This pain was intense. She looked at the hallway before her. The sconces, the paintings, windows, everything seemed to multiply.

She fell into a bowing position as she clutched her head. Her fingers tangled her white locks as she tried, unsuccessfully, to put enough pressure on her head to make the pain stop.

Bijou was whimpering. If her vampirification process wasn't harsh enough, this surely would be the thing that killed her, and she didn't even know what it was that was causing this!

And suddenly, she was swept into a cold pair of arms.

"_Cherie_," Stan cooed, walking slowly down the halls with her in his arms.

Bijou was still mad at him, but she was too tired and in pain at the moment to really care. "What's happening?" she finally let out, pressing her head against his chest.

"Your body attains an inhuman strength when you become a vampire. As your physical form tries to get used to all the power, it's almost on a high for a few days. Usually after your first feeding, your body gets reminded that it does, in fact, need sustenance, and now it's being reminded that it needs sleep."

"This pain is because I'm _tired_?" Bijou asked in between winces.

"It will get better from here, _Cherie_, I promise you," Stanley explained. "Your body is at its absolute low at the moment, but a night of sleep will cure you of all of it."

Sleep _did_ sound so very nice right now, Bijou admitted. Just a moment later, she was in Stanley's bed, eagerly enveloping herself in the black sheets.

.

.

When Bijou woke up the next evening, she felt like a completely new person, so energized and refreshed. She took a few seconds to fall back into her pillows and stretch her hands, feeling such wonderful power flowing through her limbs and to her fingers.

"You seem better."

Bijou let out a gasp as she turned to her side, seeing Sabu diagonally across from her, leaning on one of the bed's posts.

Her eyes narrowed. Sabu did not like her, that much was obvious from his constant glares and his overall change of voice when addressing her. Even now, he seemed to be giving her a patronizing glare.

"Would you like something to drink?" he offered. He pointed to a chalice sitting on Stan's desk. Immediately, the chalice lifted off the wooden surface and floated in front of Bijou's face.

"Telekinesis," Bijou said, shocked. She took the cup and set it on the nightstand, not very thirsty at the moment.

"It's quite a useful ability," he added, walking around the bed.

"And what is yours?" he asked, stopping at her feet and sitting down on the bed.

"I don't know," she huffed. "But I _do_ know that you are here to check on Sandy's well-being, not mine." She eyed him cautiously, and not wanting any trouble with Stanley for bothering her—not that he really cared about disturbing Stan—Sabu decided to play nice, for the time being.

"Of course." Sabu stood and started to walk away. Little did she know that she had an incredible power, one Sabu was aware of. Stan had told him all about it earlier that morning. She was quite remarkable if what Stanley said was true.

With one last look at Bijou, Sabu opened the bedroom door and left.

Both Bijou and Sabu were left with the thoughts, _What a strange vampire._

There was a thunderstorm outside, and Sabu did not notice as he sped through the corridors that, between the flashes of thunder, the silhouette of a winged-beast flew.

.

.

Sabu watched with interest as Sandy walked through the library, examining the particular section regarding diseases.

"It's no longer here," Sandy sighed.

"What is it?" her maker asked.

"A book," Sandy said as she sat down at one of the tables. "It had a dark green cover and a red ribbon."

"And what was so special about this book?" Sabu took the seat across from her.

Sandy looked to the side. "I just remembered reading it a long time ago."

"From when you were still human?" he asked. At this, Sandy looked at him.

"I lived here in this castle while I was human, didn't I?" she smiled bitterly to herself. "Sabu, you must tell me…" she took his hands into her own, "does the name Maxwell Librius mean anything to you?"

"No," Sabu said matter-of-factly. Sandy looked down at her lap once again.

"Then I truly must be delusional." She bit her lip, though, looking at Sabu expectantly.

"You took me to the library—that was an interesting choice," Sabu said idly as he looked around.

"You still will not tell me?" she asked. Her maker leaned toward her.

"It is for your own good."

"But surely a vampire must know how she became this way!" Her head lowered.

"Whatever is happening, Sandy, will pass eventually." He tried to massage her hands with his.

"I am not sure of that anymore." With shaky eyes, she excused herself from the library. Sabu watched her flash away. He stood himself, ready to follow her, when another voice called out.

"Why won't you tell her how she was turned?" Bijou asked, stepping out from behind an aisle.

Sabu was impressed. He had not been able to detect her presence. Perhaps she wasn't as weak as he thought. But that didn't make her any less trustworthy. In fact, it just raised his suspicions about her.

"Because I keep my promises," he said tersely. He wanted to leave when Bijou called out to him again.

"And what does that mean?" Bijou stepped forward, her rose-colored gown and cape flowing behind her.

"It means that I was asked not to tell them of that night." His patience was wearing thin with this one.

"You can tell me," Bijou suggested. She was now just a few inches away from him, her hands folded in front of her. "I would like to know how Stanley became a vampire."

"It is not your decision to make whether you hear the story or not," he reminded, his voice sharp with malice. "And in fact, I'd like to hear more about _you_."

Bijou stayed quiet as he walked around her, observing her from every direction.

"You still have your human memories," he reminded. "They should've been eliminated days ago."

Bijou opened her mouth to speak, then closed it, then finally said, with clenched fists:

"I don't remember what country I came from…!" Sabu could tell that this particular fact was causing her great distress.

"You're French, are you not?"

"I know that," Bijou repeated, lips pursed as her fists tightened. "But I also know that Stanley and I met in a different country. I can't remember which one."

Sabu smiled. "Better late than never."

.

.

"It's best that she forget her memories as quickly as possible," Stanley mused, leaning back in his chair. They were both in Stanley's study, a room Stan reserved for paying his bills. Today, however, he was having a rather interesting conversation with Sabu.

"Did you two not have a serene courtship?" Sabu's voice was wicked with amusement. Stanley looked to the side.

"I did horrible things to her, but they were all _for_ her, really. She understands that now."

Now, Sabu was actually interested. "What sort of horrible things, exactly?"

"And what is _your_ interest, exactly?" Stanley knew that the older vampire couldn't care less about his life with Bijou.

"Sandy only started having these visions once your mate arrived, did she not?"

"Yes," Stanley added, "but they started well after Bijou's arrival." He wasn't sure where Sabu was going with this.

"History repeats itself," Sabu said flatly.

"I don't want to know!" Stanley reminded, slamming his fists against the desk in his study. He looked down at the surface and saw a few cracks.

"I will not tell _Sandy_, which is precisely the reason you asked me to never tell you," Sabu reminded. "I do think at least one of you should know the story."

"If my human self asked you to never speak of how we were turned, there was a reason for that," Stanley reminded.

"Your human self did not ask me. Your _vampire_ self did."

Stanley sighed. Vampires lost all their memories of being a human and the first few days of being a vampire. He obviously did not remember asking Sabu for this discretion, but fate had brought him such wonderful things during his time as a supernatural creature that he hardly felt the need to dwell in the past.

That, and he knew, though he never admitted it, that it was something he desperately did not wish to visit again.

.

.

"Normally, his visits calm me. I'm not usually this frantic without him, though. This is a first-time ordeal for me," Sandy explained as she lay on her bed. Bijou had the girl's head in her lap and was staring out as she listened to the older vampire.

"You seem fine right now," Bijou reminded, glancing at the strawberry-blonde for a second before she looked back up.

Sandy laughed. "These visions—or maybe they _are_ memories—they come whenever they wish." Suddenly, she was sitting up, looking at Bijou. The maddened look had returned; Bijou had spoken too soon.

"I feel happy, sad, disappointed, excited…I feel so many emotions whenever I have these visions!" her hands were trembling in front of Bijou. "I can remember the smells, the sounds, the faces, those blue eyes…"

Bijou lifted her face for a second as Sandy continued.

"They're so, so real! And…and I know they have to stop…!"

"Why?" Bijou cupped the girl's face. "What is so wrong about them?"

Sandy grabbed her gown and tore into it with her fingernails.

"I think…I know…no, I think…well, it's like I know!" she cried.

"Know what?" Bijou asked, forcing the girl to look at her. Sandy let out a choking sound and shook her head.

"You don't understand. Something horrible happens at the end of these memories," she said as she looked to the side.

"Do you know what it is that's so horrible?" Bijou asked. Sandy shook her head.

"I did know, at one point. But I can't remember—it's too much—I don't want to remember!"

The girl started crying into Bijou's shoulders, and Bijou started patting the girl's back.

"There's a countdown in my head," Sandy said, barely audible. "I _cannot_ let it get too far."

"Shhh, it'll only get better from here," Bijou soothed. But Sandy would have none of it.

She pulled away from Bijou and looked at her, shaking her head all the while. "They come when I sleep, when I am awake. They come even if I have not fed, and sometimes they come when I feed. I think the only way to rid myself of them is to die the _true_ death!"

Bijou enveloped the vampire in a hug, her own emerald eyes widened as she kept repeating, "No, Sandy, don't say that…_don't say that…"_

"_Say that again, Duke Tigre," The King ordered as he watched Stanley. The younger man was quite nervous, as he imagined many others would be. Having to tell his ruler "no" was not exactly a safe choice, but he would not let his sister fall into a loveless arrangement with a man well over twice her age. _

_Stanley nodded, nervously pressing his fingers into the top of the King's desk. "I think, Your Majesty, that there are far better prospects for you than my sister," he repeated. _

"_And why do you say this?" The King was quite amused. The Duke before him was incredibly nervous, despite the confident air he had moments ago._

"_She is just so…" Stanley paused, looking around. "So very inexperienced, and not as mature as Your Majesty, if I may be honest."_

"_I believe she has matured quite nicely." The King's lecherous smile made Stanley grip his armrest. He had to remain calm. _

"_She is so very young, Your Majesty," Stan tried, this time with more fervor as he leaned forward. _

"_She will live the life of a Queen. I cannot imagine any young girl desires for anything more," The King reminded. "In time, she will find her life to be most luxurious and realize that all her inhibitions—and yours, for that matter—were misplaced."_

_Stanley's jaw locked, though he tried to keep a smile on his face. "You already consider her your fiancée, Your Majesty?" Sandy hadn't even had a proper conversation with the ruler yet!_

_This was bad. He was just not taking no for an answer. He had to do something soon…how could he let his sister live out the rest of her life in this abysmal castle with a seemingly more abysmal tyrant?_

"_In time," The King droned on, "she will come to find that I am a man she can very easily trust…"_

"I don't trust him," Bijou said as she paced around her and Stanley's bedroom. She had a hand on her mouth as she thought aloud.

"His visits aren't doing anything for Sandy—I've been watching them whenever they're together! And then the way he looks at me, Stanley!"

Stan was sitting on top of the desk in his bedroom, leaning into his knees which were hoisted on the desk chair.

"Well I don't trust him either, _Cherie_, but he does normally bring her some sort of happiness whenever she sees him," he explained. "Granted, Sandy's never displayed behavior similar to this in the past…"

"So whatever effect he normally has on her isn't working," Bijou reminded. "Can we please kick him out?"

Stanley looked around. "Careful, _Cherie_, he can most likely hear you when you're this frantic."

"Then let him hear me!" Bijou cried as she turned around, hands in her hair with exasperation.

"We cannot ignore the fact that he is Sandy's sire, and Sandy is my sire, so there is a hierarchy that must be obeyed. Frankly, _Cherie_, you are at the bottom of these social strata."

"Well I don't see you walking on eggshells around Sandy—normally—so I don't understand why he must be given so much respect. He clearly does not like either you or me," she reminded, looking at her mate.

"He is also very old, and therefore earns our obedience automatically." Bijou rolled her eyes. However, something outside suddenly caught her interest.

Bijou walked past Stanley and opened the French doors that led to the balcony. A split-second later, she came back into the room, a small yellow bird in her hands.

Stanley raised an eyebrow, but before he could ask, Bijou started explaining.

"It's the middle of winter but this little thing was outside! Isn't it precious, Stanley?" she asked, stroking the soft yellow feathers of the little creature.

"Very good, _Cherie_. I can teach you how to kill it," Stan said as he flashed beside Bijou. Bijou, however, immediately flashed away.

"Why would I ever kill it?" she asked, horrified, as she sat on her bed, knees tucked under her. The little bird made a few chirping noises, and tried to escape, though Bijou's grip kept it in her hands.

"They make the perfect-sized snacks, especially for a newborn such as yourself," Stanley explained. He was now sitting across from her on the bed. Bijou gave him a look of disbelief, but he continued onwards.

"Now you can either snap its neck or try to push the air out of its lungs. I recommend the former because birds have some bizarre sort of respiratory system—"

"Absolutely not," Bijou cried. She immediately flashed back to the balcony where, from what Stanley could see, she was trying to whisper something reassuring to the bird, nuzzling its unknowing face against her cheek.

Then she let the bird go. When she came back inside, Stanley did not seem amused.

"_Cherie_, you are far too empathic," he said, giving her one last look before flashing out of the room. Bijou sighed—aha! So she _could_ sigh—and fell onto her bed, letting her thoughts run freely for a few moments.

.

.

"I've heard about those powers." His voice was gruff but he spoke slowly, trying his best to remember memories from centuries ago. Stanley could not hide the shock on his face.

"Her ability to conjure monsters when she is threatened is something I thought unique to her," Stanley admitted.

He and Sabu were on the castle's roof, idly looking at the gray sky above them and the paling green fields that seemed to go on for miles and miles.

"No, though it is excruciatingly rare." Sabu sat on one of the ledges, lost in thought, not even slightly fazed by how high he was off the ground.

"I just cannot believe she was able to have this ability when she was still a human," Stanley mused. He paced around the roof for a while when Sabu looked at him.

"Wait…what did you say?" He was now standing in front of Stanley, grabbing him by his shoulders and shaking him.

The younger vampire, was, of course, taken aback.

"Well, when she was still a human I did something that she didn't quite agree with and all of a sudden, those giant monsters started appearing. There had to be at least a dozen, of all different sizes…"

"And you didn't think to tell me of this earlier?" Sabu let go of Stan, disgusted.

"She's my mate. She's always been able to physically affect me," Stan reminded. Sabu looked as if he were dealing with a child, and relatively speaking, he was.

"'Physically' meaning she can make your undead heart actually beat for a second or make your fingers feel numb if you see her in pain!" Sabu grabbed his hair and walked around.

"So what does it mean? I don't understand the point you're trying to make!"

"She was a strong human," Sabu replied, almost humming to himself as he tilted his head to the sky. "You must be careful with her."

"Yet she is a slow vampire who doesn't even realize her own power," Stanley reminded. "If she fought in a battle today, she'd be quite weak."

"No." Sabu's eyes watched as a little yellow bird flew around the castle.

"I don't believe that at all."

.

.

Bijou tilted her head to the side as she observed the easel.

"It needs something, don't you think?" she asked one of her maids. The maid shook her head.

"Not at all, Mistress Bijou! The little bird is positively life-like!"

"Really?" Bijou stepped back from the easel and shrugged. It would be far easier if she had the bird before her as a model.

But before the maid could reply, Stanley barged into her bedroom. He glared at the maids.

"_Leave_." Without hesitating for a second, the maids immediately scurried away, closing the door behind them.

"That was unnecessarily rude," Bijou huffed as she stood up, her slate-colored gown and cape falling behind her.

She walked around her bedroom, which was more or less her art studio now, and sat on her bed. Stanley remained in place, keeping his eyes on her sharply.

"What?" Bijou finally asked after a moment passed of this eerie silence. Her voice showed that she was not amused by his latest antics, and his body language made it obvious he was also not pleased.

"_Cherie_, haven't you thought it odd that you don't have a power?" Stanley asked. _Or that you cannot see your power?_ But he wouldn't ask that, not yet.

"You told me that it's mostly likely a defensive power that hasn't come out yet," she reminded, crossing her hands over her chest.

"Haven't you also considered it bizarre that you have retained all your human memories—"

"_Not_ all of them—" Bijou tried reminding him, but before she could explain further, he cut in again.

"_And_ your human emotions?" he asked.

"Well aren't mates supposed to make each other feel emotions?" she asked as she got off her bed and flashed in front of him. "I spend almost every hour with _you_."

"It is not the same thing," Stanley reminded. He looked back at the bedroom door. "Also, the fact that you have not gone crazy for the maids' blood is curious."

"When I first had blood, I wanted to drink their blood, but my hunger was easy to control," she explained.

"That's just unnatural, _Cherie_! Your behavior is nothing like a newborn vampire!" Now Stan was grabbing her by the shoulders and trying to make her see.

"If I'm such a fail vampire, Stanley," Bijou started to say as she slapped his hands off of her, "maybe we should look at the one who turned me."

She turned away from him, walking out to her seldom-used balcony. She noticed something out of the corner of her eye and opened the French-glass doors to see what it was.

Stan appeared behind her, his temper growing short as he saw his mate look at something on the ledge.

"_Cherie _-"

"This little thing," Bijou said as she moved aside, revealing the little yellow bird that had visited her yesterday, "…It returned."

Stanley looked at the bird. It looked unnatural sitting on the snow-covered ledge. Perhaps even stranger was the twig of red berries it carried in its mouth.

"Is it the same one you saw on my balcony yesterday?" Stan asked.

"Who knows? But I think so…" Bijou said. "I wonder where it got the berries from…?" The little bird then hopped off the ledge and flew away.

Bijou picked up the twig of berries and walked inside, her mate following her.

"Would you care to explain what had you so…" she paused, tapping the twig against her nose as she thought of the word, "…critical, Stanley?"

She had spoken so softly, with the curious look in her eyes she had when she was still human, when she was still the one that Stanley fell in love with. He didn't mean to be so abrasive with her; he had just wanted to show Sabu that his mate, the first vampire he ever turned, wasn't a waste. And even if she didn't realize she had such an amazing power, who cared? Stanley knew she had it; he knew she was unique, at least to him, and that's why he chose her out the billions of girls in the world.

"I…I must apologize, _Cherie_," he said at length, flashing in front of her and grabbing her hands in his own. "I was just frustrated."

"Because of Sabu?" Bijou's voice was barely above a whisper.

"He keeps putting doubts in my head, or at least trying to," he admitted as he let his head rest against hers.

"He hates me. He has from the moment he's seen me," she sighed.

"It's probably because you're a much prettier version of Francoise," Stan mused. Bijou smiled.

"I'm tired," she said, tugging on his hands. "We should go to bed."

.

.

Sandy was lying supine as she stared at the night sky, her hands idly drawing circles on the rooftop. She was a gorgeous sight: her curled, strawberry-blonde locks were sprawled around her porcelain face. She looked too beautiful to be real, especially in her dark green gown. The castle was so far removed from any city that every little star in the sky would've been evident, had it not been for the clouds always blocking the way. But she rather liked the clouds. They moved at a glacial pace, but they were fun to watch. Rather relaxing, now that she thought about it.

She had tried for months to deprive herself of sleep, but nothing seemed to stop these visions. And she was so desperately tired. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, almost sensing what would come next. Sandy fell asleep listening to the sound of her brother's voice, telling a conversation originally held over two hundred years prior…

"_So we're staying here for a while?" She asked as she sat on her bed._

"_Just for a while," Stan reassured, pacing around the room. "At least until The King accepts that you don't want to marry him."_

"_You've told him, then, Stanley?" Sandy was nervous. She wasn't expecting her brother to have rushed things, but she was glad he did, even if it meant standing up to The King._

"_I couldn't have made it more obvious without telling the old Loon that you want nothing to do with him, but he insists that you'll change your mind!"_

_Sandy winced. "Brother, you must be careful. We cannot speak ill of The King in his own home."_

"_Perhaps we'll get thrown out if he hears us."_

"_Or beheaded! Stanley!" Despite the severity of the situation, Sandy was smiling._

_Sandy fell onto her back, imagining the night sky that would be forming behind the gray ceiling._

"_I'm sorry," Sandy hummed. "For putting you into such a precarious situation."_

_Stan snorted. "Hardly. No one forces my sister's hand," he smiled at Sandy. "Things will work out."_

"_I hope so," Sandy breathed._

_._

_._

_Sandy hesitantly followed The King as he led her through the gardens of the castle._

"_My family has spent years recreating these gardens," he explained to her, giving her a reassuring smile as she held onto his arms._

"_Seems a shame, though," Sandy observed. "The fog is rather thick today. I cannot see much."_

"_Unfortunately the fog rarely lets up." As The King said this, Sandy felt a wave of depression take over. What a sad thought._

"_It can be lovely," The King mused. "When the clouds start surrounding the windows of the castle, you feel as though you are living on clouds…as if you are the King of Heaven itself."_

"_But when you're on top of the clouds and you look up, you can still see the sun," Sandy reminded. "Being on top of clouds and yet seeing more clouds makes it seem as if you are living somewhere in between Heaven and Earth."_

"_And that is why this castle was called 'Être Dans Les Nuages'," The King explained. "Your soon-to-be home, my dear. You will always be welcomed here."_

"_To live in the clouds?" Sandy asked. "It fits, I suppose."_

"_To daydream," The King corrected. "Once you look outside and see nothing but gray, everything seems unreal, as if your surroundings are made of dreams and are untouchable."_

"_Forgive me, Your Majesty, but I hardly see how this can be thought of as lovely," Sandy cried. _

"_But when you're this high and untouchable, you are safe, my dear Sandra," he explained. They rounded a corner, and Sandy's eyes widened slightly as she saw Maxwell standing underneath a tree, taking notes on something about the tree's bark. Maxwell looked up and saw her, on The King's arm, and he quickly looked away._

"_Safe?" Sandy asked as she tore her eyes away quickly, pretending like she didn't see the young researcher. "From what?"_

_The King looked at the sky and narrowed his eyes. "I pray you never find out."_

.

.

Francoise was sleeping, this Bijou made sure of as she closed their guest bedroom door. She had already made sure Stanley was still resting when she left. Luckily, Stan had once told her that Sabu liked to get up in the early morning, when not many others were around. Apparently, vampires of his age didn't need much sleep.

She was moving quickly, though not flashing. She was still wearing her satin white negligee, intent on getting some sleep once this was all over. She had an idea of where he was—probably a vampire ability. Either way, she did not want to make any fast movements.

She arrived at the top of the foyer stairs, watching him as he looked at one of the tapestries hanging above him, a chalice of blood in his hands.

"It's early," Sabu said, never tearing his eyes off the tapestry. "Why are you up?"

"I can ask you the exact same thing," Bijou reminded, not hiding the sting in her voice, though she knew someone as old as he hardly needed any rest. She descended slowly, lips pursed.

"When I first saw you," Sabu added, "you had an aura about you—an innocent, _human _ aura." He finally looked at her, "I knew something about you wasn't normal."

"An aura?" Bijou rolled her eyes. As she reached the landing, she tied her hands in front of her and approached him slowly.

"I guarantee you, nothing about what I say to you will sound innocent," she whispered. Sabu amusedly arched an eyebrow.

"You're trying to get Stan to turn against me…why?" She was standing just inches from him.

"I don't trust you?" Sabu offered. "You have your old memories, your emotions, Francoise's vision, no power…"

"But I drink blood, I can still move at inhuman speeds, I can't eat regular food anymore, I have _fangs_. Does that mean nothing?" Bijou asked. "And I don't like how insulting me is your way of sticking it to my mate."

"Stanley's an idiot. Him turning you is proof of that." Sabu turned away from her and continued sipping at his drink, leaving Bijou with her mouth hanging open in disbelief.

"I was _dying_!" She cried as she appeared before him.

"And he should've let you die," Sabu said flatly. Bijou's jaw locked. Her speed had never been faster than when her hand moved, practically breaking the sound barrier, as she slapped his face, the shock knocking the drink right out of his hand.

The space between them was silent for a moment as Sabu looked up and recoiled from her attack. He let out something akin to a growl and before Bijou knew it, some invisible force was holding her against the wall, keeping her neck pinned. Sabu was still feet away from her, but he was glaring at her. He was ready to kill her.

_His telekinesis is so strong,_ Bijou thought, panicking as she felt the pressure along her neck increase. She didn't need to breathe—the lack of oxygen wouldn't kill her—but snapping her neck off her head surely would do the trick.

"You twat. I think I'll just finish you off right now," Sabu said as he stalked towards her.

"I knew it would come to this, I just didn't think so soon."

Bijou's torso was shaking under the force. She tried grabbing her neck, but it was as if a barrier was keeping her hands from touching her skin. She felt a mild shock every time her fingers got close to her neck.

"You monsters," she said as her body involuntarily jolted forward a little, "are so paranoid. Always thinking that someone is after you. I originally had no problem with you."

Sabu almost laughed as his face came just a centimeter away from Bijou's.

"'You' monsters? Ahh, child, have you forgotten that you are one, too?"

When Bijou just looked at him, her eyes enraged, like a maddened bull, Sabu just shook his head.

"And I am no monster," he continued. Bijou's hands turned into pale fists. The shadows were moving. "I simply want to protect my progeny."

"Let's get something straight," Bijou hissed, her eyes now lowering. "You have no regard for what is and isn't yours. You take whatever you desire—_whomever_ you desire! You are murderers." She pressed her head against the wall as she inhaled shallowly. "That is a monster, a creature that is as feared as it is deadly."

Her emotions were filling the room with a choking air, something that might've collapsed Stan since her feelings affected him so dearly, but Sabu was just impressed that her neck hadn't broken yet.

"Do you have a point?" he asked, putting on a smirk to cover his curiosity at her stamina. Hearing his words, Bijou's rage seemed to suddenly multiply ten-fold. Bijou did not like being patronized, not at all.

Sabu had never quite seen such an angered look in a vampire's eyes ever. Wait, yes he had, _once._

"_Every_ vampire is a monster, and _every_ single one of you deserves to BURN IN H—"

Sabu never heard the end of that statement, for before he knew it, a black dragon that had to have a wingspan of at least thirty feet flew at him before he even realized it was coming. It knocked him to the ground and he slid another fifteen feet or so due to the force of the monster.

Bijou wasn't sure what had knocked Sabu out just now. She looked around. Neither Stanley nor Sandy were there, but she didn't have time to worry. Her neck had just been released, and, after rubbing it to make sure everything was still in place, she walked over to the KO-ed Sabu.

Sabu looked up when he saw Bijou's shadow loom over him.

_No…_It wasn't just _her_ shadow. The massive dragon, which looked more like it belonged in a fairytale than in this foyer, hovered behind Bijou protectively, casting her into its shadow. When it exhaled, even its breath came out in black smoke puffs—_hot_, black smoke puffs. Sabu could feel his left leg, the closest part of him to the dragon, start to burn.

She, however, had no idea of it. Her eyes were practically slits.

This was incredible! _She_ hadn't even really attacked him, not in a "real" battle sense, anyway. Her ridiculously strong powers activated on their own and took no physical affect on her. Was there any real winning against this?

"What do you want?" he asked, remaining on the ground. He debated getting up and fighting her, but from what Stanley had told her about the multiple monsters she could unwittingly conjure, this would be a severely one-sided battle.

Bijou was now kneeling in front of him, making sure to look him straight in the eye. The dragon lowered his head and made sure to stay just inches away from Bijou's side as she spoke.

"I want you to leave," she said, eyes now widened and looking straight into Sabu's eye. "Leave this castle and never come back."

Sabu's eye widened, and he leaned back further on his elbows, tilting his head back and nodding.

The dragon, sensing Bijou's victory, faded away.

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_Everything, everyone she loved was so far away._

_Sandy moved her spoon through the soup, her eyes looking down and her mouth falling a little open. _

_What was happening to her? Lately, nothing had been feeling right. Dancing wasn't making her feel better, singing wasn't working, either. True, she had been quite distraught after her parents' passing, but she had hoped that she was slowly moving on. _

_Yet today she realized her disposition was slowly fading back into depression. She didn't feel like herself anymore. She would lie in bed, dreading waking up, yet hating what she saw at night. All she could imagine was a life of servants tripping over her, rich, majestic gowns, caravans that stretched for miles, and…_

…Him_…_

_Sandy looked across the massive dining table, watching her "fiancé" drink his soup. She looked down again and pressed her lips together._

_He was so much older. He was sure to be so much more mature—most of their conversations seemed to revolve around him trying to teach her something, her feeling so insignificant—that connecting with him intellectually seemed almost impossible to Sandy. There was never any information exchange. Nothing mutual, including her feelings for him._

_Yes, it did not help that she was not in the least bit attracted to him._

_You'll be a Queen, Sandy! The most respected, desired women in the kingdom! All your subjects will love you! _

_Sandy closed her eyes and kept reminding herself of the balls and beautiful gowns and jewels she would receive over and over again, at least until she accepted them. Thoughts of material goods would have to pleasure her until she grew some sort of emotional attachment to this situation._

_Or at least until she could find a way out of this…_

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Francoise placed a pale hand over her mouth, not knowing how to answer as she watched Sabu pack his few belongings into his leather bag.

"Shouldn't we at least wait until nightfall?" she finally asked. Francoise had black circles clouding her normally-flawless face. It was hard to believe that just a few moments ago, Sabu had woken her, even going as far as to draw the navy blue curtains in their bedroom open, throwing light onto her face. He wanted her up as fast as possible for he had some newfound urgency to leave.

"No. We'll be travelling amongst humans so change your attire immediately," Sabu ordered, not even looking at her. His mate looked down at her flowing white nightgown and shook her head.

"Not until you tell me what has gotten into you," she explained, placing a hand on his forearm, her voice so soft but her words with such an edge that she almost sounded like she was hooting.

"Not here. I'll tell you everything once we are off the premises," he hissed, pulling himself away.

Francoise knew something was terribly wrong. She also knew her mate was ridiculously strong and unbelievably smart—he had a reason for doing this and as her maker and elder, she should obey willingly. She went into their adjoining bathroom, but came out a second later, her hand resting against the doorframe.

"And what about Sandy? Is she going to be alright?"

Sabu, who had his back to his mate, turned around. His worried look caused Francoise to immediately flash before him, holding onto his arms as she looked into his one visible eye for support.

"No, she will not," he said quietly.

"Then why are we leaving her?"

Sabu blinked. "I don't know, but I _do_ know that we must leave."

"This is not exactly making sense—"

"I know," Sabu cut in. "But we cannot stay in this castle."

Francoise stepped back. Her face lit up with realization. "Where were you this morning, Sabu?"

Sabu's eye lowered. "Get dressed. Be discreet. We must try and leave without anyone knowing."

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Sandy opened her eyes, never feeling more tired, looking around as she suddenly felt a sense of emptiness sweep over her.

Wordlessly, she practically flew out of her bed, only making it to her bedroom door, where a little piece of paper shone in the morning light. The wind that came out from opening her door so quickly blew it a few feet away. She walked over to it.

With trembling hands, Sandy gently picked it up, reading over the words. She took an unnecessary, deep breath and leaned against the stone wall behind her.

_He's gone…_

"_They're all gone, Stanley," Sandy explained._

_Stan looked up, placing the pen he was holding gently onto his desk. With a bittersweet smile on her face, Sandy closed the door behind her and sat down across from her brother._

"_Who are gone?"_

"_The maids," Sandy sighed. "And the chefs, the seamstresses, the bakers…anyone who could be spared, really."_

"_And where did they go?"_

"_The market," Sandy said, leaning her head back and letting her strawberry blonde hair almost hit the floor. She always was incredibly flexible._

"_Then they should be back soon," Stan said, looking at his sister curiously. "Yet you seem rather disturbed, Sandy."_

_Sandy's eyes suddenly became as crestfallen as the broken smile on her face. She sat straight up, her face strawberry red with all the blood that rushed to her head. _

"_I suppose, brother, that no one told you why everyone was sent to the market today?"_

"_No, I can't say that anyone has."_

_She started tracing a pattern in the dust on Stanley's desk._

"_His Majesty is making arrangements with the caterers, the tailors, everyone actually."_

"_Sandy—"_

"_Brother," Sandy said, looking at her twin with tears brimming her brilliant eyes, "I thought I could be happy with The King. I thought I would have to try for both of our sakes and that no girl would be sad if she were a princess, but Stanley I feel nothing for him! I cannot live my life with someone who I cannot love."_

_She reached her hand out to her brother. "I tried, Stanley, I really did. You have to believe me. I'm sorry."_

_For a few seconds, the only sound between the twins was Sandy's broken cries._

_Stan placed one of his hands over hers. "Then we must escape this castle as soon as possible. No one, not even The King of France, will force my sister's hand."_

_She looked up, shocked that he was so willing to help her. She was half-expecting him to convince her into the marriage. Most brothers would have done their best to cajole their sisters into marrying The King, into giving both of them a life of security and riches._

_Sandy sniffled, all the while forming a smile, "Thank you, brother."_

"Thank you," Bijou told the maid before she closed the door to Stan's bedroom.

"What did she say?"

"That Sandy's still in her room," Bijou explained, sitting next to Stanley on their bed.

Stanley was also unusually tired, but he forgot his own physical needs when he realized what Sabu's leaving would probably do to his sister's. However, Bijou had informed him that Sandy would most likely prefer to be alone at the moment so the two of them would be most helpful by keeping their distance.

"I cannot believe Sabu left without even telling us where he was going!"

"You did say that he was very old and had many contacts. He probably couldn't stay in one place for too long," Bijou reminded. She gently started running her fingers through Stan's hair.

"Sandy's more important to him than any ordinary contact," Stanley snapped. He looked down, but as a thought hit him, his eyes went to his mate.

"_Cherie_, was it you? Did he leave because of you?"

"What?" Bijou's eyes widened, watching Stan sit up.

"He clearly did not like you. I wonder if that influenced his decision to leave…?"

"Well then that's horrible, to let his hatred for me affect him more than his duty to Sandy," Bijou huffed.

"Still, it's so bizarre," Stanley let out as he fell back onto his sheets. "He is normally someone that has his priorities in order."

Bijou pursed her lips, noticing from the faint light coming through the pitch-black curtains that it was sunny today.

_What an abysmal day,_ _Sandy thought as she sat beside the fountain. The wind had finally settled down, letting her think in peace. The little brown patches amongst the once-green pastures seemed to be the only remnants that summer was once here. The bitter winds and endless clouds promised nothing short of a brutal winter._

_Sandy watched the fish swim in the fountain, wondering how soon this fall weather would start its descent into winter. She also wondered if the fish were killed and served for dinner during the winter, or if they had an indoor tank. She desperately hoped for the latter._

_Everything around her had no color, she noted drearily. Especially in the garden, where one would suspect there would be the most colors due to the foliage and flowers, everything seemed to have a gray coating. A year ago, this day was so filled with happiness and color and emotion. How life could change in one short year—it was incredible._

_She slouched as she felt a couple of tears chill her skin. She smiled bitterly as she remembered how her mother would scold her for sitting in such an unladylike fashion._

_She took a deep breath and shut her eyes, wiping away the tears from their corners. Feeling sorry for herself wouldn't do anything. And she couldn't keep depending on her brother to bail her out, as if he wasn't busy enough already. If she wanted out of this arrangement, she needed to make a path for herself._

_She straightened up and let her hands ball into fists. This was _her_ life, and she could not blame anyone else if she let it turn out not-as-expected. _

"_Even if it means losing my life, I have to tell The King that I will not marry him," she said so softly that even she had trouble hearing herself. A few seconds passed, however, and realization slowly dawned on her._

"_Who am I kidding?" she cried, sweat-dropping as she realized how risky it was to upset The King. She had heard the rumors about the maids, servants, cooks who with one wrong move—a window that was too dusty, a potato that wasn't seasoned enough—that would be thrown into the castle's dungeon without warning. Perhaps it was cowardly, but Sandy had to take small steps._

_But if it was so risky, how could she expect her brother to do it for her? It was not fair for him to sacrifice so much for her sake. _

_For a few seconds, she could feel her mood start to spiral downwards all over again. Maybe she was right when she said that staying in this castle the rest of her life was fate. Trying to fight it could be a colossal waste of time. _

_And that's when she saw it. It landed clearly in her lap, its beautiful, red coloring illuminating the grayscale around her. _

_Sandy picked up the red ribbon, wondering where it had come from. It was rather tattered from the ends, its color fading at each of its poles. But the material was a very nice, imported silk, one of such high quality that even Sandy, being the daughter of a duke, could only afford a few. _

"_May…may I have that back?" _

_Sandy turned around, immediately recognizing the voice. Unbeknownst to her, a genuine smile formed across her lips, albeit a small one. _

"_Maxwell Librius," she said, standing up. He was heaving, clearly out of breath. Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion until she remembered what he said. _

"_You want this back?" She held the ribbon up skeptically, blinking a few times._

"_Err…yes," he finally answered. "It doesn't belong to me, though!" he added as he saw Sandy's strange look. "Well, no, I mean it _does_ belong to me, but before that it belonged to someone very important to me and I'd like to have it back if you don't mind?"_

_Sandy's mouth fell open as she held out the ribbon to him. "Then here you go."_

_Maxwell's face lit up as he took back the ribbon, staring at it as if it were a lost treasure. _

"_She has excellent taste in ribbons," Sandy said._

"_Yeah," Maxwell agreed, never taking his eyes off of the strip of fabric. "She did."_

"'_Did'?" Sandy repeated, unable to keep her eyes from widening. _

_Maxwell looked up, suddenly blushing, as if realizing for the first time who it was he was talking to._

"_My mother," he said quietly. "She passed away a few years ago. This was…her favorite ribbon, and I use it as a bookmark—but today, the wind was so strong and I forgot I left a window open that the ribbon just started flying away—"_

_Maxwell stopped as he realized Sandy was untying something from her neck._

"_Lady Sandra, w-what are you doing?"_

"_Something as important as that from your mother should not be an everyday item," she said quietly, sliding the red ribbon she wore around her neck off her smooth skin._

"_When you get back to your room, put your mother's ribbon somewhere safe, somewhere where the weather cannot touch it, and in the meantime, you may use this," she explained as she took his hand, placing her ribbon into it._

_Their hands lingered together for a second too long before Maxwell—staring longingly at the union of their hands—finally pulled away._

"_I can't—what's wrong?" He just realized that there were tears rolling haphazardly down her face._

_Sandy's face reddened and she quickly turned around, sloppily wiping away the water with the back of her hands. _

"_It's this despicable wind! I keep feeling all sorts of debris flying into my eyes," she choked out as she collapsed onto the bench._

_Maxwell looked around, making sure no one was in sight as he sat beside the aristocrat. _

_He gulped, nervously putting a hand on her shoulder. The girl beside him was whimpering, placing her nimble fingers over her mouth._

"_What's wrong?" he repeated, this time more slowly and calmly. "Should I get His Majesty?"_

"_No!" Sandy cried, turning her head quickly, giving him the most pleading look she could. "I'd…I'd much rather he never found out about this—about me feeling upset."_

"_Alright," Maxwell agreed, his hand still on her shoulder as he watched her intently. In the back of his mind, he couldn't help but think: She was rather beautiful, even with her face scrunched up and reddened with tear streaks, though he knew for a fact she was far more stunning when she smiled._

"_Today's my mother's birthday," Sandy admitted. "She also passed away, just a few months ago actually, and I cannot help but to think of her."_

"_I heard about the late duke and duchess," Maxwell said quietly. "I'm sorry."_

"_Sometimes I feel as though if she were still alive, she never would have let this happen," Sandy admitted, scrunching her face in an effort to stop the tears._

"_Let what happen?" Maxwell urged, but Sandy only stiffened. She seemed to have an epiphany as to what she had been doing. Shaking her head, she pulled away from him and stood up, almost tripping over the sudden weight of her gown and cloak, but she didn't care._

"_Thank you for your care, Mr. Librius, but it was wrong of me to unload all of my worries onto you. Please do forgive me," she said, swallowing back her cries. Maxwell stood in hopes to stop her, but she looked panicked._

"_Please stay back," she said, holding out both her hands. "I will…take care of myself."_

"_But Lady—"_

_Without another word, Sandy turned around and dashed away, disappearing in the light fog around them. Maxwell opened his mouth to call after her, but decided against it on the chance that it would attract unwanted attention. However, he looked at the two ribbons in his hand, his eyes more longingly gazing at his new one._

_._

_As he closed the curtains to his study, the King idly wondered what his young researcher and fiancée could possibly be discussing._

_._

_._

_Maxwell lazily closed the book before him, for once in his life not eager to take in the words on the page. As he stared at the new, red ribbon in his book, he leaned his head on one of his hands and sighed. _

_He had half the mind to explore the castle and find the young Lady Sandra, but he dismissed the thought as soon as it came. He had work to do. And besides, The King had always been a wonderful boss to him, sometimes a little demanding, yes, but he provided Maxwell with a generous salary and a place to live. It was not Maxwell's place to interfere with his marital—or pre-marital—affairs. _

_But still, as he thought of Sandy's face, red and stained with tears, he felt as though he could not focus on his work. _

"_I need to apologize, once again," Sandy said, startling the young researcher. Maxwell looked up, astonished, and to be perfectly honest, a little happy, to see her standing there. _

_He stood. Sandy looked to the side. Her eyes were puffy, Maxwell noted bitterly._

"_No, Lady Sandra, there is no need to do that. Please, sit," he offered, though Sandy shook her head._

"_I cannot take up too much of your time with my problems, and for burdening you I apologize again, and also for running off yesterday when you were just showing me common courtesy," she said quietly._

"_You're still upset," he observed. "Clearly something important is bothering you."_

"_But with all due respect, Mr. Librius, this is none of your business and you need not get involved," Sandy repeated, eyes blank, "I am your superior and soon to be…soon to be Qu…"_

_Sandy excused herself rather quickly and moved to another side of Maxwell's tiny office, dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief she had learned to keep at her side._

"_That's it," he said as he moved around his desk, hesitantly approaching the girl. "You don't want to marry His Majesty." Sandy immediately turned around, eyes widened with fear. _

"_No, no, of course not! Don't be ridiculous! What kind of girl wouldn't want to be a princess?" Though as she finished the last part, she let out a sob that she apparently failed to suppress._

_Maxwell gently led Sandy away from the small corner and pulled out the chair across his desk. As he sat her down, she curled inwards, suddenly feeling cold. It took a few moments for her whimpers to calm down, but as she spoke, she gripped the handles of her chair tightly._

"_It's hard," she said as she looked at him, across from her. "When I see him, I don't feel anything, nothing at all! When I look into his eyes it's the same sort of apathy all over again. I've tried so hard to talk with him, to spend time with him…"_

_Maxwell remembered all this as he leaned back in his chair, remembering seeing Sandy on The King's arm as he led her around the castle, watching through his window as Sandy and His Majesty stepped out of a carriage after spending an entire day together, seeing The King try to give the girl dance lessons (Maxwell was often asked to research some music that was known to stimulate a girls' emotions for her partner). All this time, he could've sworn Sandy was helplessly in love with the royal, but nothing could be further from the truth as he watched the broken girl in front of him._

"…_and nothing seems to work," she cried, looking into her lap. _

"_Your brother…he's a Duke," Maxwell reminded, but Sandy shook her head, knowing where Maxwell was headed with this talk._

"_That's just it, though! A Duke is only second to The King! And His Majesty will not listen to my brother when he tells him that I do not wish to wed him, and I am afraid that if he presses His Majesty any further there will be severe repercussions for him!"_

_Maxwell understood her fear all too well._

"_I am trying to accept the fact that I must live the rest of my life with someone I do not care for in the slightest, but it is difficult," she said, once again patting her eyes with her napkin._

"_I can only imagine," Maxwell added quietly._

_Silence stayed between them for a few minutes, but as she sniffled she couldn't help but smile at the man across from her._

"_Thank you, Maxwell Librius." Sandy smiled. "For listening. I must admit I find it rather easy to talk to you."_

"_I hardly did anything," Maxwell reminded. "But I am happy to see you smile, Lady Sandra."_

_Another silence came, though this time Sandy just looked at Maxwell, torn between smiling or just staring at him, mouth agape. Maxwell, realizing what he said a second too late, quickly rubbed the back of his neck nervously._

"_I think I would prefer it if you called me Sandy instead," she breathed, never tearing her eyes away from him._

_Maxwell was taken aback, but let himself smile. "Alright…Sandy."_

"_So I bet you must know all about the vampires that allegedly live in this kingdom!" Sandy beamed, nearly causing Maxwell to fall out of his chair with her sudden change in personality._

_._

_._

"_So they're not afraid of garlic?" Sandy seemed amazed. _

_It was a couple of hours after Sandy first came into Maxwell's office, and now the two of them were sitting behind Maxwell's desk, their shoulders pressed against each other as the two of them squinted to read the tiny font on a book Maxwell had conjured up about the legendary French vampires._

"_Apparently not," Maxwell said. "I've told this to the maids, but they still insist on spraying every corner of the castle with a mixture of garlic and holy water!"_

"_I'm glad I'm not the only one who finds that smell offensive." Sandy rolled her eyes and cringed, remembering all those mornings of waking up and getting an extreme whiff of garlic all over her bedding._

"_Your brother doesn't complain about the odor?"_

"_I think he would," Sandy admitted, "Except he spends so much of his time flirting with the maids, he probably forgets to tell them to stop."_

_Sandy, before she could stop herself, let her head fall onto Maxwell's shoulder._

"_It is rather nice to know I'm not the only one interested in these legendary monsters," she sighed._

_Maxwell was currently petrified. This was wrong, very, very wrong. _

_But it felt nice, very, very nice. _

_He figured the girl was tired and probably did not get much sleep last night, but that did not give her the right to be so intimate, nor should he, as a loyal subject, allow this behavior to happen! Not to mention the trouble the two of them would be in should they get caught!_

"_Sandy," he said, quickly getting up and nearly causing the girl to fall on her side. Before she could properly respond, however, he pulled her up._

"_It's awfully late, and there is no doubt that dinner will be served soon," he reminded. Sandy looked out the window and agreed once she saw the setting sun._

"_Of course His Majesty will be expecting you," Maxwell added, "So it would be best if you left."_

_Sandy stared at the man. "Alright…" Getting the not-so-subtle hint, Sandy turned around and headed out of his office, walking through the library and into the rest of the castle._

_A shadow watched Sandy emerge from the library. Little did she know, that same shadow had watched her go into the library a couple of hours earlier._

_That shadow, in the form of one of Sandy's maids, quickly made her way up a hidden staircase and into The King's study._

"_It's just as you said, Your Highness," she said, collapsing on her knees and bowing, out of breath, "she was in the library this entire time…"_

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_To think, you've been lost in this daze this entire time,_ Bijou thought, shaking her head as she watched Sandy toss and turn in her sleep.

Bijou wondered if Sandy was even getting any sort of sleep, for she was moving far too frantically and fervently to actually be in a state of slumber.

Soundlessly, she moved to Sandy's bed and sat down, gently taking a hold of the older vampire's hand.

Sandy's eyes seemed to open suddenly at the girl's touch, trying to sit up but Bijou pushed her back down, shushing her.

"I know you're tired and have been even more distressed since Sabu left," Bijou explained. "But your brother and I are incredibly worried about your health, so please, Sandy…"

Bijou lowered her head, so that her emerald irises were only a centimeter away from Sandy's lime-green ones.

"…_go to sleep…"_

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"She doesn't seem any better," Bijou explained. She brought her knees up to herself and buried her face into the beige fabric of her gown.

"I don't know what else to do. We can't exactly take her to a doctor," Stanley reminded, lying next to his mate and looking out blankly at the ceiling above him. Feeling a sense of depression wash over Bijou, he turned his head and looked at her. Seeing Sandy in such a state was truly taking a toll on the white-haired beauty. Indeed, she seemed to be transfixed on her dress despondently, and her eyes were lowered as if she would burst into tears at any second.

"_Cherie_-"

"Stanley, please," she said quickly, turning to lay on her side with superhuman speed.

"Please," she pleaded, placing one of her icy hands on his equally-cold face, looking him straight in the eyes. "I just want to rest. Let's please go to sleep."

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The next chapter is up! You can go read it right now!


	5. Part IV: Mirrored Flower, Watered Moon 2

**PLEASE READ:** I uploaded chapters 4 and 5 together, so please make sure you read the previous chapter (_Mirrored Flower, Watered Moon 1_) before this one! Or else you might be severely confused!

**CN**

**Les Nuages de la Perdition**

**Part IV: **_Mirrored Flower, Watered Moon_

**Final Act: **_Of Cold Blood_

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_Maxwell stepped into the town's best tailor shop, expecting to place an order for a new vest as his old one was getting a little frayed around the ends and he suddenly felt the need to keep up appearances (he had no idea where this came from). What he was not expecting, however, was to see a flurry of the castle's maids within the tailor shop._

_All the talk momentarily came to an end as the castles' maids, huddled together in a circle in the middle of the store, immediately looked at the newcomer._

"_Mr. Librius!" "Do we know him?" "Ahh, yes, he works in the library!" "I thought the tailor shop was closed to outsiders for the day?" "Should we get a man's opinion?"_

_The half-dozen or so maids in front of him seemed to suddenly make a unanimous decision. All those eyes darted to him, forcefully ushering him forward into a back room of the tailor shop._

"_I-I don't understand what's going on…!" Too much of a gentleman to push any of the girls off of him, he decided to comply as they took him into a lavish fitting room decorated with imported, gold-encrusted settees, matching ornate mirrors, and the most beautiful bride in the world to top it all off._

_Maxwell didn't even have to wait to see her turn around. That fresh, floral smell that always seemed to float around her already filled his nose, and he realized that should have been the dead give-away the second he stepped into the shop. Even though her back was to him, he could still tell by the stunning golden color in her curled hair that it was her._

_It only took a couple of seconds for Sandy to turn around, but Maxwell felt as though he had been staring at her back for hours. When she faced him, a bright smile formed across her lips, finishing the look. _

_This was something one of the maids in the room silently took note of._

"_Maxwell!" she cried, waving a bouquet of white roses wildly as she stepped off the little stage she was on. _

"_What do you think?" she asked, forgetting herself for a few seconds who she was meant to wed. She was just so happy to see Maxwell._

_All the maids leaned forward to hear his answer, and as he looked over the gorgeous, full-sleeved, pearly gown whose beautiful train trailed her by a good four feet, along with the matching veil that, with the light fabric of the dress, seemed to melt away into her skin. The natural light coming through the windows touched her body so gingerly, as if the rays were crafted just for this very moment. It was a shame he always saw her in the lightless, hollow environment that belonged to the castle._

"_I would not change a thing," he finally said, eliciting a cheer from the maids, but Sandy was the only one who picked up on the single note of melancholy in his voice. _

_In that moment she, too, remembered what life had handed her._

_Sandy's mouth fell open once again (he seemed to have that effect on her) as the maids dragged her into yet another back room, never able to reply to his comment._

.

.

Bijou had been walking through the castle hallways, looking for something or other as inspiration for her paintings, when she saw it through the open double doors.

It was lying on the massive dining table, its glossy pages reflecting the dusty sunlight coming through the stained glass windows. It had been so long since Bijou had seen one that she hesitated for a few seconds. However, that hesitation did not last all that long.

Slowly, she moved into the dining room, her mouth falling a little open as she moved closer and closer to it and saw what was on the page. As she finally stood right in front of it, her body started fluttering with a bubbly sort of excitement that she could not ever remember feeling before.

_How pretty!_ She picked up the magazine, staring at the girl's beautiful dress. Her eyes widened as she flipped through the pages, her excitement rising with every new picture she saw.

"_Cherie_!" Bijou didn't look up, still too entranced with the magazine, as Stanley walked into the room. He stopped a few feet away from her, wondering why he could sense such surreal pleasure emanating from her. It was so strong it had woken him from his sleep, evoking a sudden need in Stanley to go find Bijou.

"_Cherie_…?" he asked, now flashing right beside her.

"Stanley," she breathed out, still looking at the pages. "Isn't it stunning?" she asked, finally turning to him and pushing the spread of the wedding dress into his face.

Stan put on a weak smile as he took a step back, causing Bijou to look at him, perplexed.

"A wedding magazine?" he asked, putting his over his mouth. His green eyes wondered around the room, taking in the annoyingly bright sunlight. He could not imagine this ending well. Stan had always thought the girl just needed more time—given how slowly she was losing her human memories—before they could touch the topic of weddings and marriage.

"I think one of the maids left it," Bijou said quietly, not sure why Stan seemed to not be able to look at her all of a sudden. "It's just…seeing all those cakes and linens and silverware designs—and of course the _dresses_—it just made me think—"

"Of having one of our own?" he offered, almost meekly, as he suddenly flashed behind her and placed his icy hands on the shoulders of her cranberry-red gown. Maybe trying to get her to relax and divert her attention to him would help her forget this topic.

Bijou turned around instantly, her hair actually whipping his face as she glared. Stan suddenly felt a draft sweep over him. She was infuriated and he was suddenly panicking.

"Stan," she said, the magazine now being crumpled in her hands.

Stanley stepped back yet again. _It was too soon…she still remembers…_

"Stan," she repeated again, her body tensing and jaw locked. Stan opened his mouth to speak, but Bijou beat him to it.

"We _had_ a wedding," she reminded. "When I was still human," she continued, her voice low.

Stanley could not hide the surprise on his face.

"It was in a garden? I wore a white, puffy dress that was covered with diamonds?" Bijou offered, noting Stanley's bewilderment. Her voice was sounding more and more confused. "Didn't we?" Bijou put a hand over her head, constantly thinking, _These human memories fade so easily into nothing…_

"We did, right?" she repeated, now unsure herself. Her eyes, as they tore into Stan's, looked so lost.

"Yes," Stan finally said, "we did…I just did not think you'd remember."

Bijou sighed with relief. "Perhaps we should renew our vows now that I'm a vampire? I'd like to remember the details this time," she suggested. Stanley pursed his lips and nodded.

Beaming, she brought the magazine to her face and turned around, humming Pachelbel's Canon in D major as she walked out of the room.

Stanley stared after his mate, not believing that she had finally forgotten, and smiled.

He flashed beside her, taking her hand and enjoying finally having found the one he was meant to be with.

.

.

"Here, take this," Bijou offered, handing Stanley a chalice of blood off a tray. Stanley took it and tilted his head back, looking at the night sky as the two of them sat on one of the garden's many benches.

"Why do you look so deep in thought?" she asked as she sat down. When Stan didn't answer her immediately, she shrugged and started taking sips out of her own cup.

"_Cherie_," Stan said at length, keeping his eyes on the starry sky, "don't you wish to leave this castle? Take a trip somewhere?"

"Naturally," Bijou agreed without hesitation. She finished her blood and placed the chalice beside her on another bench. "But taking Sandy with us in her current state is out of the question, and we can't just leave her with a babysitter, Stanley…"

Stanley exhaled and turned to his mate. "I must apologize for continuously treating you like a prisoner, _Cherie_. If it were up to me we'd have toured every continent—at least twice—by now!"

Bijou smiled, cupping his face with one of her hands. "I'm sure we'll get that chance soon enough, and if not, no matter. Maybe living in this castle for years and years on end is my destiny?" she suggested.

Stanley's eyes widened, instantly earning a worried look in return from Bijou.

"What's wrong?"

Stan seemed to be lost in another world, where, for a fraction of a second he saw his beautiful, human sister step out of a carriage, looking at the castle that she thought was stunning the first time she ever saw it.

When Stan came to, he looked past Bijou and at the gray, stone walls of the castle behind her.

_No, no_…This could not be happening, not to him!

"_Maybe living in this castle for the rest of my life is my destiny?"_

"You should probably get some sleep," Bijou offered. Dazedly, Stan turned his eyes back to her. She looked so genuinely worried for him, and to be honest, if his sister's current mental state was any sort of indicator, she had every reason to be.

"Kiss me," he ordered, "_Now_."

Before Bijou could properly take in what he was asking, he smashed his lips against hers, throwing his own chalice somewhere on the grass. He started moving his fingers through her hair. He had to forget about this—this never happened, this never _happened…_

…_That's what Maxwell kept telling himself, running a frustrated hand through his chestnut locks. There was no point in dwelling over something so trivial. She was not his; he had to stop thinking about her all the time. He barely knew anything about her, anyway! It was just foolish to let her encompass his every thought._

_He felt a wet feeling on his elbow and cringed as he saw the ink pot he had spilled all over the letter he was writing. _

_Maxwell sighed and quickly swiped his pen, ruined paper and empty ink pot off his desk and into an adjacent wastepaper basket. He normally wasn't so messy, but he could not find himself caring about cleanliness at the moment. _

"_Mr. Librius?"_

_Maxwell looked up and saw a maid standing in the doorway of his office. He beckoned for her to come in and she stood across from him at his desk, holding a rather large, wooden box in her arms. Maxwell stood and took the box from her, surprised at its weight._

"_His Majesty has excused your duties for the rest of the week."_

_The man looked at the maid, shocked. But he quickly looked back at the heavy box in his arms. _

"_I…see," he said, resting the box down on his desk. It had a bronze latch on it, and when he unlocked the box, he was shocked at what he found._

_There were about a dozen bottles of beautiful, expensive ink along with some stunning stationary with hand-painted flowers on it, placed with some equally-lovely pens nestled in blood red velvet._

_Maxwell was smart enough to figure this out. "His Majesty chose extraordinary paper for his wedding invitations."_

"_Lady Sandra chose the paper," the maid informed, smirking for a second when she saw Maxwell's eyes widen. "Another maid will be by later today with the complete guest list," she explained._

_He quickly shut the box and kept his eyes on the smooth, polished surface as he asked, "And what am I to do until the list arrives since I have been relieved of my duties for the time being?"_

"_His Majesty did not specify," the maid replied. "He did ask, however, for you to work very diligently on the invitations. The wedding will be in one month's time, and he would have asked a printer but he prefers your calligraphy."_

"_His Majesty is too kind," Maxwell mumbled. He looked down and saw a beautiful, red ribbon poking through one of his books out of the corner of his eyes._

_._

_._

_It had been four days since the maid had given Maxwell the stationary; he had also received the very extensive guest list the same day, but Maxwell had honestly been procrastinating on writing them. He was normally the type to get his work done immediately, but he would rather measure how fast the grass was growing in the south lawn than write these invitations. _

_And though he did not have very much experience with girls, he knew exactly what the reason was for his newfound laziness. _

_As he walked through the castle, heading towards a kitchen for some lunch, he heard a voice that made his heart stop. He froze in his tracks and followed the voice—she was laughing, such a stunning sound! _

_The door to the grand dining room was slightly open, and though this was completely against Maxwell's nature, he pressed his Ham-Human ear against the door and listened. He wasn't intending on listening for long; her laughter seemed almost therapeutic to him, that was all, he told himself._

"_I prefer the one with the silver flowers," he heard her say. "I think they match the invitations much more." He could just barely see Sandy standing next to a small, round table. The long dining table had been removed to make room for the decorations Sandy was apparently choosing._

"_Lady Sandra, I believe the pale blue flowers compliment the rest of the décor you have selected far more than the other linens," one of the royal florists explained. She handed Sandy what looked like a square of fabric, and he saw Sandy nod._

"_Which one do you think His Majesty would prefer?" she asked excitedly. "I do want to make sure everything is to his liking as well!"_

_Maxwell's chest tightened as he heard how much she cared about the aesthetics of the wedding. This didn't make any sense!_

"_I can ask him right away!" the florist beamed, and Maxwell backed away from the door as the florist quickly pushed it open and ran out._

_Maxwell was used to thinking things through. He wasn't spontaneous, and he certainly did not intrude on others when he was clearly not invited. It just was not who he was. However, he could not stop himself as he opened the dining room door, earning a startled look from Sandy as he walked in._

"_Maxwell…?" she asked, putting down the color swatches she was looking at. She quickly looked around the room, thankful that no one else was there._

"_I don't understand, Sandy," he said, still standing in the doorway and wringing his hands. _

"_You're the official researcher for His Majesty. I'm sure you understand far more than I do," she smiled weakly, picking up the swatch and turning around. _

"_Now if you'll excuse me, Maxwell, I have some silverware to choose," she said as she moved to another table that was lined with various forks, spoons and knives all with distinct designs etched into them._

_Maxwell scowled, something he was not used to doing. He was finding it increasingly impossible to control his rising anger._

"_You told me just a few days ago that you could not bring yourself to marry The King and now you're excited over choosing the adornment for your wedding to him!" Maxwell cried._

_Sandy quickly turned around and practically stomped over to Maxwell._

"_Keep your voice down. You are in the presence of a Lady," she hissed. When Maxwell's stare did not waver, Sandy shook her head._

"_And what am I supposed to do? My brother isn't getting through to him, His Majesty dismisses me every time I even _think_ about postponing the ceremony, everyone's busy planning the wedding—I am just trying to keep up appearances!" she turned around again, and Maxwell had to restrain himself when he realized she was wiping her eyes again._

"_And maybe if I want the wedding enough," she said, walking to the window and looking at the stormy sky, "…Maybe, I'll come to want him." She sighed and wiped her eyes again._

"_Girls get married to men they don't love every day. Every single day. I am no different." She pulled out her trusted handkerchief and dabbed her eyes._

"_But you're…so sad…! You can't think that lying to yourself will bring you happiness!" Maxwell wasn't sure what to do at this point. He normally did not care so deeply about the feelings of one he barely knew, but Sandy was clearly wrapped up in the idea that this fate was inevitable. He could not let her go on believing that._

"_Please leave." Maxwell looked up in time to see her beautiful green eyes glisten. "This is none of your concern and there is nothing you can do."_

_Maxwell's mouth fell open. He had seen her upset, seen her cry and worry over her engagement and imminent wedding. How dare she imply that he had no sort of attachment!_

_And as if to prove her wrong, to show how much he cared, he startled them both by marching right up to her and, without warning, his hand moved to the back of her head and he kissed her._

_Neither of them had ever been kissed before, and though Sandy at first was tensed and did not know how to respond, she started to realize that this feeling was kind of, sort of amazing. Maxwell, likewise, had not intended the kiss to last for more than a second, but he felt as though kissing her and holding her against him was like satiating a thirst he did not know he had. _

_The two of them pulled apart for a second, rouge cheeks and shallow breath, and looked at each other. This separation was incredibly brief as they immediately kissed again, this time Sandy's fingers running through his brown mane. For those short, few seconds, time seemed to have stopped and Sandy felt a renewed hope coursing through her body._

_They were so absorbed in each other that neither of them noticed when one of the doors to the dining room opened, a speechless figure watching the scene unfold before him._

"_SANDY!"_

_Sandy immediately pushed Maxwell away from her as she saw Stanley quickly close the door of the room, careful to not let anyone else walk in._

_Maxwell's face blanched, and Sandy could do nothing but bite her lip and pray that her brother would not kill the young researcher._

_Stanley walked closer to the two, and Sandy started stammering, "Brother, this—this is Maxwell Librius…!"_

"Maxwell Librius," Sandy breathed out.

Bijou looked up. She was currently dusting the desk in Sandy's bedroom (she never did trust some of the maids around Sandy's belongings when Sandy was in such a state—she swore a few trinkets had gone missing from her room as well) when she heard Sandy say the name.

The white-haired vampire put down the duster she was using and sat beside her on the bed. Sandy had been in a deep sleep for quite some time now, and this was the first time Bijou had ever heard her coherently say a name.

Though, this was not the first time Bijou had heard this name in particular. She recalled Sabu and Sandy's conversation from the library…

Perhaps this was worth investigating. Bijou knew this had something to do with Sandy's human past, and though Stanley did not want Bijou lurking in that timeframe of his and Sandy's lives, she figured what Stanley did not know would not hurt him.

"_I know who he is," Stanley cut in. He sent a glare in Maxwell's direction, causing the dark-haired Ham-Human to quickly look away. _

_Indeed, he and Maxwell had been acquainted soon after he and his sister arrived at the castle. Stanley had even asked Maxwell to find him some papers regarding the dukedom's economy. Stan had always thought of him as a respectable man._

"_What you saw, Stanley—" Sandy tried to explain, but her twin left her no room to explain._

"_Will have you both hung for treason against The King! What would have happened if someone else saw you in such…" Stanley had no words as he put his hand on his forehead, "…in such a compromising pose?"_

_Sandy realized her brother seemed more worried than mad._

"_So you're not angry, brother?" She asked tentatively. Stanley looked at her as if he could not believe what we was hearing._

"_Of course I'm mad! Why did you not just come to me to tell me that the reason you could not marry His Majesty was because you were in love with someone else?" he cried. _

_Sandy paused. She looked at Maxwell and then looked down. "This—what you saw—was not planned, Stanley. Maxwell and I have only really talked a few times. Love is a rather strong word," she explained._

"_Though I suppose it fits," Maxwell finished for her, grabbing her hand. "I have never felt this way about anyone before. The first time I saw you Sandy, I…I couldn't stop thinking about you!"_

_Sandy's eyes widened. Her heart was pounding and she felt a flurry in her stomach. Seeing him look at her like that caused a nice kind of shiver to run through her. This was such a bizarre feeling. She didn't need to say anything for Maxwell to realize that the feeling was mutual._

"_And what do you plan on doing now?" Stanley decided to remind them that he was also in the room._

_Maxwell looked worriedly at Sandy. "Duke Tigre is correct," he reminded. "We could both be executed for doing this!"_

"_There must be a loophole in the marriage laws of this kingdom. His Majesty is acting arbitrarily by forcing your hand, which is a clear violation of the Ham-Human Magna Carta," Stan added._

_Maxwell shook his head. "The original Magna Carta had a clause which forbid a man from forcing his marriage to a girl of lower status, but that was omitted about five-hundred years ago when the charter was revised."_

_Sandy's eyes visibly fell. "So he is allowed to do this?"_

_Stanley cursed under his breath. "The wedding is in a little over three weeks. We're running out of time to stop this ceremony."_

"_Well it doesn't matter to me if I do not get a wink of sleep until then—I will get you out of this arrangement," Maxwell promised, cupping Sandy's face with his hands._

_Sandy's eyes shook. "Maxwell…"_

"_We can start researching today," Stanley added, "We will scour every law book and charter until we find a way to free you. This has to be some sort of slavery."_

_Sandy nodded, "Thank you, brother, for being so understanding!" she ran to Stanley and embraced him, crying into his shoulder. "Thank you!"_

_._

_._

"_I am positive, Your Majesty," the maid explained as she kneeled before the old man. "I was only able to open the door to the dining room slightly in fear of getting caught, but there is no mistake in what I heard."_

"_Having an affair with my own employee?" The King asked, stroking his beard with a slight smile on his face. His fiancée and researcher were quite foolish if they thought they were being clever. _

"_It seems I must show all those beneath me that _I _am the one that rules all," he drawled. "It's a pity they could not see that for themselves." _

Bijou could not believe what she was seeing. This was the third website she had tried, coming up with the same response as the other two sites. Sighing, she printed the page and watched it come out of the printer beside her. After it was done, she leaned her head back in her chair, rubbing her eyes which were irritating her.

She stood up, walking around the game room, and stopped behind the couch. She picked up the remote and turned the television on, watching the same news reports as always.

Bijou lowered her head, clutching the fabric of the couch as she—albeit painfully—felt a few tears emerge from her emerald eyes.

_Later that night, Maxwell's blue eyes widened as he heard a knocking on his bedroom door. Sometimes a guest would arrive in the middle of the night from a faraway land, and The King would need a translator—which would, of course, be Maxwell. But usually, the rapping on his door wasn't so fervent._

"_I'm coming!" he called out as he splashed some water from the nearby sink onto his face to rid him of the tiredness in his eyes. The knocking was only getting more and more impatient, so Maxwell decided to not bother drying his face as he walked to his door._

_As he opened the door, he was met by a punch in the face._

_Maxwell fell backwards due to the unexpected impact. When he was able to sit up, he found himself surrounded by a circle of swords pointing straight at his neck._

"_Maxwell Librius, you are under arrest," one of the guards barked. Maxwell's jaw locked. The second he had felt the man hit him, he had become far more concerned about Sandy's well-being rather than his own. He could only pray that they hadn't gotten to her, as well._

"_For thievery from The King," the guard finished. "It is a Capital Offense."_

_._

_._

_Stanley practically forced open the door to Sandy's bedroom in the early hours of the next day. Sandy tiredly looked up, but when she saw Stan's frantic appearance, she immediately jumped out of bed._

"_Stanley—"_

"_Maxwell's been arrested!" Stan whispered, though with an angered tone. _

_Suddenly, a ringing took over Sandy's ears. "Wha…?" She felt a heavy weight drop to the bottom of her stomach._

_Stanley nodded. "One of the maids informed me just a few moments ago about it. She saw the guards take him to the dungeon."_

"_There's no other reason he would be taken there!" Sandy cried, putting a hand over her mouth._

"_Which means His Majesty is aware of what we're planning. We must leave this castle while we can," Stanley explained, taking his sister's wrist. "Or else we will meet the same fate as Maxwell." He started leading her out, both still wearing their nightclothes, towards the direction of the castle gates._

"_No! I have to go see him! We have to help him!" Sandy protested. She grabbed her wrist back, running in the opposite direction towards the dungeon._

_Stanley sighed and immediately caught up to her, stopping her and facing her. _

"_Sandy," he huffed out, "the dungeon is where His Majesty keeps the ones who will be executed."_

_The words chilled Sandy. Slapping her brother's hands away again, she glared at him._

"_That is all the more reason to find and him free him."_

_._

_._

_Sandy practically flew down the nautilus-shaped staircase that lead to the dungeon. It was one of the few parts of the castle she had never been to, but she still knew exactly where it was. Her brother was right behind her. Sandy was barefoot so it gave her a little more control over her movements as she moved fervently down the several hundred steps._

_She stopped when she got to the landing, the gate that lead to the dungeon._

"_It smells horrid." Stan put a hand over his mouth, looking at the raised gate of the dungeon. "Let's get him and get out as soon as possible—It's already suspicious The King hasn't ordered your capture."_

_Sandy paused. "Aren't there supposed to be guards outside the dungeon?" she asked Stanley, and the two of them just realized they hadn't seen any guards all day. "And isn't the gate supposed to be lowered?" _

_Stanley went to a suit of armor located just a few feet away from the gate. He pulled out the sword, sighing in content when he realized it was still sharp._

"_Yes—we have to be careful."_

_The two of them walked quietly into the vile odor, the only sounds being Stanley's boots lightly crunching the rats' bones that littered the dungeon floor. Sandy's eyes moved desperately from side-to-side, searching for any sign of Maxwell. And that's when she saw him._

"_Maxwell!" she cried, running to the man that was bolted by his wrists to the wall. He was unconscious. She lifted his face and saw bruises upon bruises spotting his face. There was also a trail of blood dripping from the corners of his mouth and down to his shirt. _

"_Stand back," Stanley ordered. Sandy did as she was told and watched her brother quickly cut the metal chains keeping Maxwell to the wall. Maxwell, no longer being held up by the support of the chains, quickly fell forward, but Sandy caught him._

_She repeated his name over and over again, touching his face wherever she saw a bruise. "I'm so sorry," she whispered into the calloused skin of his face, kissing his cheek as if to let him know she was there._

"_If only there was a way to get out of the castle from here," Stan said as he helped Sandy support Maxwell up. "But we have to climb all those steps back up and find a way to get out of the castle's property without anyone noticing."_

_Sandy did not dwell on the fact that the odds were ridiculously against her. She and her brother simply stood, each holding onto a part of the researcher, as they started making their way as quickly as they could out of the dungeon._

_However, just as they got to the gate, it instantly lowered. Stan cursed as he saw the guards sulk out of the corners of the dungeon, emerging from the darkness._

"_Let us pass. We are your superiors," Stan hissed, holding out his sword, however with one arm supporting Maxwell, Stan was not properly positioned for a sword battle. One of the guards laughed as he, without warning, quickly swung the sword out of Stanley's hand using his own sword._

"_They answer only to me," a voice called out. Stan and Sandy both looked up and felt the heat leave their bodies._

"_And now I have all the evidence I need to remove you from your post as Duke."_

_The King, like his guards, slid out of the shadows. Sandy's grip on Maxwell tightened, something he noticed with his eyebrows cocked. _

"_Let us see…What have we got here?" he asked, his eyes wandering to Maxwell. "Taking away my prisoners just hours before they are to be executed…? You both could be locked up for the rest of your lives." _

_Sandy was enraged._

"_I don't want to marry you! Why would you want to force an existence with someone who can't love you in return?" She cried, her body shaking with fear. Her echoes bounced off the dungeon walls and repeated all around her, giving more and more power to her words._

"_And so I should let you run off with my treacherous little librarian instead?" The King offered, shaking his head. "And how is that fair to me?"_

"_What you're doing isn't just. If we inform the Parliament—" Stanley started, but the royal quickly silenced him._

"—_Do you think Parliament will risk their lives and challenge my authority for the sake of a young girl?"_

"_A noblewoman. An aristocrat," Stanley reminded, leaving Maxwell to be supported by Sandy as he stepped in front of the two protectively. "You are not the only one with power in this kingdom!" _

"_True, but I have the _most_ power, and in this current situation you are in no position to argue your rights," he reminded. Stanley glared. He was currently running through scenario after scenario in his mind. There were four guards behind The King. How many could he realistically take out or evade while still getting Maxwell and Sandy out of the castle? _

_Maxwell coughed, blood spurting from his mouth all over his clothes. He was experiencing internal bleeding after all the physical torture he had to endure. As Sandy watched this happen, all she could do was feel her eyes tremble, mouth dry up and face dampen with tears._

"_I will marry you," Sandy declared, looking at Maxwell and then back at The King. She ignored the shocked expression Stan gave her and his pleas, "Quiet, Sandy! You don't know what you're saying!"_

"_So you have finally come to your senses, my dear," The King smirked. With a quick movement of his wrists, he had the four guards surrounding Stanley at the tips of their swords and he moved towards Sandy. He looked at the girl quizzically, noting her vice grip around Maxwell's form._

"_You will not release him?" The King asked her. Sandy pressed her lips together._

"_I will release him when _you _release him," Sandy explained. "His life will be spared."_

_The King let out a laugh. "He plotted against me—"_

"_So did I," Sandy reminded, voice stiff. "We were both planning on living a life together once I could escape from you. If you execute him, you must do the same with me."_

"_You have no authority to dictate punishments," the royal reminded. "He will be left here."_

"_Then I will take my life, the second you drop your guard. When I'm sleeping or in the bath, or maybe I'll jump out of a moving carriage. I guarantee you, taking his life will mean me taking my own," she snapped. _

"_Sandy!" Stanley cried, trying to run to her but being instantly stopped when the guards kept their swords pointed directly at his neck, petrifying him._

"_But if you spare him," Sandy continued, "and let him go from this castle, I will happily marry you and we'll have a wonderful life together. We'll travel and go to parties and we'll have beautiful children, one or two or even a dozen if you prefer." There were diamond-like tears welling up in her eyes, "And you'll finally have an heir to carry your name on."_

"_You would do that, give your life up, for this man?" The King asked, still smirking as he reached out and touched Sandy's hair. "Do you think he would show such bravado for you?"_

"_I do not know," Sandy lied, doing her best to ignore his touch, "but I know enough about him to realize that I cannot see him die."_

_The King sighed. "Very well, he shall be set free." He snapped his fingers and one of the four guards surrounding Stanley appeared beside Sandy, grabbing her by her elbows and tearing her away from Maxwell. The unconscious man almost fell due to the lack of Sandy's support, until another two guards left Stanley (leaving only one that kept his sword at Stanley's throat) and moved to Maxwell, whom they hoisted up. The young researcher's head tilted downwards._

"_What about my brother?" Sandy asked, wiggling in the guard's grip. She could take a life of being trapped in a loveless marriage, but she could not live if either Maxwell or Stanley were hurt in any way because of her. _

_The King drew out a sword from his side. Stanley and Sandy's eyes widened. The sword glistened with a platinum sheen despite the dim lighting in the dungeon. The King could see every bit of fear in Stan's eyes in the sword's metal as he pulled it out._

"_Your brother clearly thinks I am not fit to be a king," he explained, coming closer to Stanley with the sword. _

_Stanley tensed as the guard holding him lowered his sword, allowing the royal to trace the tip of his blade against Stanley's neck._

"_And what if I were to tell him that I think he is no longer fit to be a duke?" he asked in his rich baritone. _

_Sandy's chest tightened with pain. When would this nightmare be over?_

"_Please—no, please!" She tried moving forward but the guard kept her in place. Her voice was every bit as defeated as Maxwell looked, but her eyes were frantic. "Please don't hurt him! I'll do anything!"_

_The King, at her words, immediately turned around, his sword still ready to strike at the woman instead._

"_You've already promised me everything I wanted," he reminded, letting the sword come dangerously close to her cheek. "Why should I listen to you?"_

"_Please," Sandy begged. "Take me and leave them alone." Her eyes were scrunched as new tears refreshed her face every second. "Stanley knew nothing of my feelings for Maxwell until yesterday!"_

"_Well, if that's true," The King pondered aloud, leaving the sword against her reddened skin, "It wouldn't be fair to kill an innocent bystander for you and the librarian's schemes, would it?"_

_Stan and Sandy both flinched with how he worded his question. Something about the way he said it did not sit well. _

_Slowly, Sandy shook her head, her eyes never leaving the monarch's, as she mumbled, "No…"_

"_I'm so glad you agree," he replied. He moved his sword away from her face…_

…_and straight into Maxwell's stomach._

_Maxwell was still unconscious when he felt himself jolt forward, a sudden, fresh pain erupting in his abdomen. His blue eyes gently opened, only to see a sword being pulled out of his stomach, his blood covering the blade. _How bizarre_, he thought._

_Sandy was screaming, he realized. Duke Tigre was yelling. Maxwell didn't have the energy to look up to see where they were, but he could hear them, though this new ringing in his ears was making that difficult as well._

_Suddenly, he felt himself fall on his knees. He realized he must've been supported by two people, but they had left. The ringing was getting louder and louder. _

"_MAXWELL!"_

_He tilted his head to see Sandy, who was also on her knees, screaming. She looked like she was in such pain. A guard was at her side, trying to pull her up, but she looked like she was trying to get her hands to reach him._

_Maxwell tried smiling at Sandy to show that everything would end up alright, to make her stop looking like she was in so much pain. He honestly believed smiling at her would make it all better. Maybe he was too numb to think rationally, but he felt a peace overcoming him. At his smile, though, Sandy's head started shaking and he could see her cry, though he could no longer hear her due to the ringing in his ears. She was saying something, though. Oh how he wished he could hear her sweet, soothing voice once more. _

It will be alright_, he thought to himself as his head started falling forward. He just needed some rest because he was really tired, but once he got that rest, he and Sandy would find a way out of this mess. Right now, he had to sleep._

_And as his head fell against the dungeon's rancid floor, he saw Sandy's nimble fingers try to touch him, almost crawling against the dungeon floor, trying to reassure him that everything would be alright, but Maxwell already knew that. His eyes moved forward to see her beautiful lime green ones—they were watering so much. It was a shame he never got to see those eyes light up and smile as much as he saw them cry._

I hope you can smile again_, he thought. He didn't even realize how much blood he was losing, just that it was in fact getting colder and colder. His shirt was becoming darker and darker. And this ringing would not stop, but now that he thought about it, it did seem to be fading. _

_As he closed his eyes, he could feel the ringing get lower and lower. It seemed to be finally disappearing. Maxwell thought he was smiling, though outwardly he was wincing with pain. It was time for some sleep. _

_The guard that had pinned Stanley seemed to be startled by The King's sudden attack. Stanley took advantage of this and elbowed his captive in the stomach, grabbed his sword, and—before the guard could get back up—swung the sword against the guard's chest. It left a nasty wound that kept the guard down while Stanley immediately swung at the unsuspecting King who was too busy pulling the sword out of Maxwell's stomach to notice._

"_What's wrong with you? You promised you would let him go!" Stanley cried, using his weapon to knock The King's blood-ridden sword right out of his hands. He backed the royal against a wall, using all the fighting lessons he had received as a child to make his moves quick and unpredictable._

"_Guards!" The King cried, but Stanley was too fast. Stan had almost plunged the sword right into the tyrannical ruler's heart, until he felt a hand around his wrist. The guards that were on either side of Maxwell left him and tore Stanley off of the royal. _

"_Don't close your eyes, Maxwell!" Sandy kept repeating, her fingers just millimeters away from his face. "Open them!" she pleaded. "OPEN THEM!"_

_But it was too late, she realized, as the guard next to her forcefully pulled her to her feet. He had taken his last breath—the last thing he had seen was her crying._

"_Guards," The King repeated, visibly shaking from Stanley's attack. It was only after he saw that Stanley was detained by the two guards that he stepped away from the wall, nervously walking past the Sandy that just kept wailing, ignoring her altogether, as he sauntered towards Stanley, anger rising with every step._

"_MAXWELL! MAXWELL!"_

"_Boy, if you had ever known power, you would think what I did was trivial," he snarled. The guards lowered Stanley onto his knees but pulled his head up by his hair, forcing him to look at his ruler._

_Stanley let out a deep, throaty laugh._

"_Forcing a girl to be with you? Murder? You're not just corrupt with power—you're a Monster," Stanley spat into The King's face._

_Sandy stopped crying, her breathing broken. She watched in horror as The King, in retaliation, slapped Stanley's face._

"_Don't the monsters usually die at the end of the fairy tales?" The King asked, soothing the hand that slapped Stan with the other. "If I were really as evil as you thought, you would end up with everything you wanted while I would meet a most painful death. And yet it is you…" The King looked over to Sandy, who had stopped her crying, her voice too hoarse to continue._

"…_who will be executed tomorrow at dawn, a day that will meet its end with me marrying your sister."_

_Stan's eyes widened. Sandy's entire body seemed to twitch and shiver at the same time._

"_You can't do that!" Sandy screamed. It was bad enough that she had just seen Maxwell die, but to hear that her brother would meet the same fate only caused the icy sensation to intensify, freezing her._

"_Are you mad? When Parliament hears about this, you'll lose your crown! You took an innocent man's life!" Stan cried._

"'_Innocent'? I believe Mr. Librius was trying to seduce my fiancée and turn her against me," the royal added, amused. _

"_He was trying to spare her from you! He saw that you brought nothing but misery to her and you wouldn't let her go yourself—You weren't taking no for an answer!"_

"_Guards," The King cut in, "Please chain Duke Tigre until it is time for his execution, and you," he turned his attention to the guard holding Sandy, "take her to her room and make sure she is well-rested for the wedding tomorrow."_

_The two twins started being pulled in opposite directions, one deeper into the dungeon and one out of the gate that slowly started rising._

"_STANLEY!" Sandy cried, doing her best but to no avail to break free._

_Stanley watched as his sister was dragged out of the dungeon. He felt a punch in his face and keeled over, not realizing, as he was chained up, that this would be the last time he saw his sister alive._

_._

_._

"_LET ME OUT!"_

_Sandy banged on her bedroom door, but it was no use. No one would come, and there were guards on the other side of the door, lest she escape._

"_For the love of God, let me out…!"_

_Her voice was so tired after screaming so much. Her eyes were so very exhausted of crying. Her body was sore after being manhandled all day. _

_She let her elbows rest on the door, her head bowing down and her tears falling straight to the ground. She was shaking._

_Was there really nothing she could do to save her brother? Thinking of him—and oh God, Maxwell's body!—so cold in that dungeon, waiting for his death…she had to do something!_

_But what?_

_If the physical pain wasn't intense enough, the horrible smell of garlic would surely cause her to collapse. Angrily, she walked to the cloves of garlic hanging off of her curtains. She ripped them off and threw them on the ground, crushing them with her feet._

_And as she felt the pungent juice of the cloves seep into the skin on the underside of her feet, a thought—a radical thought—came to her. _

_She stepped away from the cloves and sat on her bed, sitting down, her hand over her mouth, and wondering whether this could actually happen. Sandy looked outside the window—in less than twenty-four hours, she would be getting primed for her wedding and her brother would be dead. She had no time to consider the pros and cons to this._

_She looked at the sheets around her, her lime eyes in a straight stare._

_._

_._

_Taking a paperweight off her desk, she used the aim her brother taught her as a child and threw it as hard as she could, thankful that her bedroom was in a secluded part of the castle's landscape. There weren't many guards or gardeners near the outside of her bedroom._

_The sound the paperweight made when it crashed through the window was thankfully hidden by the chime of the afternoon bell, something she had carefully planned. The entire stained-glass window had shattered, leaving colorful shards all over her floor. She picked one up, stuffing it into her dress—something she had only changed into because she knew she was about to head into town—and, using the rope of sheets that was tied to one poster of her canopy bed, she lowered herself out of the window._

_It took a few moments, and Sandy once thought that she was about to lose her grip and fall to her death, but through careful maneuvering and the lucky fact that there were no windows beneath her own, she was finally able to feel the grass beneath her._

_She had to stay alive, even if only to ensure her brother's survival._

_Sandy had purposefully chosen a green gown with a dry sort of hue, something that easily blended into the grass as she ran as fast as she could through the lawns of the castle and into the adjoining forest._

_._

_._

_It was mid-afternoon by the time Sandy had arrived in town. She was sneezing and couldn't feel her nose due to the dropping weather, but she couldn't care less. It was getting darker and darker outside, and as she wove through the streets, she noticed it was getting exceptionally less populated as well. She had never seen people be so adverse to staying outside when it was dark. What was once a tragically overpopulated city was looking more and more like a ghost town as the pinks and oranges in the sky started to fade to black._

"_Children, hurry, hurry! You mustn't leave the house at night!" A mother was calling her kids back to her small house, and they quickly came to her, knowing that the danger their mother indicated was very much real._

"_You should be inside," a tavern owner told Sandy, opening his door and shedding warmth and light on her dark, cold figure. "Come inside while you still can, child." He told her, holding out his hand to her, but Sandy shook her head._

"_No thank you, sir, my house is right over there," she lied, pointing to a nearby row of houses. The tavern owner looked suspiciously at her, but Sandy kept a forced smile on her face as she ran down the cobblestone streets that made up the kingdom's capital. _

"There's a certain street in town," _she remembered Maxwell saying that day he spent hours telling her about the monsters, _"_De Sang Froid_—it's apparently where they all meet at night. You can't miss it; all the houses are empty, all the stores boarded up. It is quite a sight, apparently. The street itself is stained with blood, and it leads into an alley where they all gather."

"Haven't people seen them, then?" _Sandy asked, confused. If they so obviously existed, why in the rest of the world were they only speculated about? Maxwell looked away, his hand on his mouth as he thought._

"Well, yes, of course. But so little is known about them mostly because if one gets caught by them, they will not return alive to tell the tale."

_Sandy moved deeper and deeper into town, sky turning a deeper shade of dark blue with every step she took. She looked at the street names, looked at the buildings around her: it seemed she was going in the right direction, for the houses started to have broken windows, the air started smelling of a butcher shop rather than the grassy, smoky aroma of a city, the streets would have random red stains, and some of the stores had large wooden boards all over their windows and doors._

_And of course, not a soul in sight._

_She moved for the better part of an hour into the night, her feet bloody and chapped from not wearing any shoes on the littered, stone streets. Her fancy dress was muddy from the hem and ripped in various parts of the skirt after rushing through the forest. She shivered and grabbed her arms, trying to warm herself. _

This was a stupid idea_, she thought, sneezing as she sat down at a waterless fountain in the middle of the street. _I've been walking in this town for so long and have found nothing.

_Indeed, even though everything around her was boarded or abandoned, she still had not found what she was looking for. She had no idea where this _De Sang Froid_ street was, anyway. She thought she was going in the right direction but surely she would have seen something by now!_

_What would she do now? Return to the castle? Try to live out her days here? But then how would she save her brother?_

_The girl slouched and found herself feeling dizzy. She hadn't eaten all day, and she was running about so much, and she had cried so, so much. _

_It was so quiet outside. She had long since passed the streets where people actually lived. Not even stray dogs or cats roamed this area. Everything around her was hollow._

_Sandy heard a creaking, the only sound around her. She looked up, seeing a street sign a few stores down from the fountain move back and forth on its hinges. It was cold but not all that windy, and that sign had been stagnant just a second earlier. _

_Squinting her eyes, she got off the fountain and moved towards it, seeing a strange glimmer every time it moved forward despite the limited visibility. As she stood under it, her eyes widened._

De Sang Froid

_Her lime eyes widened more as she realized what was written under the sign in what could only be fresh, Ham-Human blood:_

"Bienvenue À Votre Perdition"

_She took a step back, repeating the words in her mind over and over again: Welcome to Your Hell_

_Sandy looked around, thinking she heard something move behind her, but nothing was there._

_She took a deep breath, pulling the shard she had placed in her dress earlier out of her chest bindings. Sandy moved around the street carefully, glancing around for any sign of life…or the undead. She was scared, but this was something she had to do. She had to stop this madness. It could only be her._

_She gripped the shard so tightly she realized her palm was bleeding. It was dark so she had to bring her palm up to her face to see the blood trickle down onto her wrist. _

_And that's when she heard a whisper._

_She looked around, still not seeing anyone, but the voice was clearly human. It was low and throaty, and she was not sure what was said, only that words were used. No other animal could speak in such tongues._

_Tightening her fist, she winced as she pressed the shard deeper into her palm, this time feeling her dizziness get stronger as the slice ripped deeper into her flesh. Tears of pain escaped her eyes. She cried out._

_Sandy immediately removed the shard from her palm and threw it away, waving her freshly-cut hand in the open air._

"_I'M HERE!" she cried, voice shaking with a mixture of pain and fear. "AND I'M NOT GOING ANYWHERE!"_

_The next thing she knew, her body flew backwards, and the next second, she was pinned against the wall of a building. There was no hand around her, but an invisible pressure around her neck restricted her movements, as well as her breathing. _

"_Now why would someone be foolish enough to deliberately try and get our attention?" A Ham-Human asked, appearing out of nowhere in front of Sandy. He was pale and had gray hair, a throaty voice, and a single eye patch over his left eye._

_And when he spoke, she could see his fangs glisten in the dim starlight._

Oh…my…

_With a flick of his wrist, Sandy found both her arms being pinned back to the wall, and her captive walked over to her cut up hand._

"_Aristocratic blood?" he asked, sniffing her hand. His eyes wandered over to her, and as his fingers fluttered across the skin of her arms, Sandy tensed with shivers._

"_Y-yes…" she spoke when she realized he was asking her a question. _

"_I'm sure they must have taught you at one point to never leave those mansions after nightfall. We love your kind of blood the most," he reminded as his tongue went out and licked some of the blood off her palms._

"_What about royal blood?" she asked, her voice displaying a newfound vigor. She was practically grinding her teeth with anger as she asked, "What would you do if you were given the chance to taste The King's blood?"_

_The vampire moved his mouth away from her hands and looked at her, a deadpanned expression on his face._

"_Sabu, this broad is insane—drain her and get it over with!" a scrawny, blonde vampire added as he appeared out of the darkness._

"_Yeah, and can we have some of the leftover blood when you're done with her?"_

"_I love her dress! I want her dress!"_

_Behind the eye-patched vampire—whom Sandy realized was called Sabu—a gang of vampires appeared, each one almost materializing out of the blackness. There were about eight of them, including Sabu; most of them were male and one was a brunette female. They formed a semi-circle around Sabu._

_Sabu ignored all these newcomers, however, as he kept his eyes on the human before him. She had sought them out and was now asking about what would be a normally impossible fantasy for vampires. Adding to that, she had an aura about her. It was enraged—such a strange air emanating from a girl who looked so innocent. She was rather intriguing. _

"_What is your name, child?" Sabu asked. The other vampires' eyes immediately moved to Sabu. He had never asked his prey such a question before. If any human was delirious enough to wander into their territory, they would attack and have no mercy. Yet Sabu was almost showing an interest in this girl._

"_Lady Sandra Tigre." Sandy lowered her eyes, "I prefer to be called Sandy, though."_

"_Sandy," the female vampire mocked her name using a falsetto, "I sincerely hope you realize this is one of the last times you will hear your name be used."_

"_Quiet, Flora," Sabu hissed, eliciting widened eyes from the vampire in question. With what sounded like a nasal growl, Flora moved away._

"_And why have you come here, Sandy?" Sabu asked quietly, moving away from her but keeping her in his telekinetic hold._

_The other vampires looked at each other, feeling shocked for the first time in who knew how long. Sabu actually gave enough importance to this girl to call her by her preferred name._

"_I…" Sandy could feel her blood boiling at the memories of today, her rage multiplying, something Sabu could not ignore._

"_I want revenge," she finally said, her eyes welling up in tears. "I want to kill The King of France."_

_The other vampires would have openly laughed if Sabu did not hold such an obvious interest in the girl._

"_And did you think we would carry out your revenge for you?" Sabu was honestly curious as to how this conversation would develop._

"_No," Sandy continued. Tears fell down her eyes as she continued, "I want to kill him on my own."_

"_So why did you come here?" Flora cut in. Sabu immediately turned around, glaring at the female vampire. She immediately quieted and looked to the side, realizing she was one outburst away from being banished from the gang, or worse…_

"_I suppose I do need your help," Sandy added, looking into Sabu's blank eyes, her voice starting to crack. "For I want to kill The King as a vampire."_

_Sabu moved his hand and immediately, Sandy fell onto her knees. She barely had time to register the fact that she had control over her limbs again before Sabu continued to speak._

"_Vampirification is a deadly process. It is an incredibly small minority that will survive, and they only do so because they realize what it is they want to immortalize themselves for," he explained. _

"_Then I am out of luck for I feel very little reason to live on," Sandy breathed. She looked up, still on her knees but with a new fortitude in her eyes. "However, I know I want to see His Majesty realize that there is someone more powerful than he. I want to see the life slowly be pulled out of him like he did to me. I want to see that terror in his eyes—I _need_ to see it. I have to save the ones I love, and to do that I have to circumvent his power with one of my own. Please." _

_Sabu instantly kneeled on his knees, freezing Sandy still as his hand lightly flew over the skin of her jugular vein._

"_Sabu, you're not actually considering her proposal, are you?" One of the vampires asked. _

"_You will probably die," Sabu told the human. "And then we shall feast on your body and there will be nothing left of you except fragments of your bones." Sandy swallowed, though quickly nodded._

"_However, if I succeed in turning you, will you promise to let us feed on The King after you have had your way with him?" he asked, causing a hungered glaze to appear in the eyes of the other vampires._

_Sandy pursed her lips and nodded. "Anything you want…"_

_Immediately she felt Sabu's hand on her face, pushing her down into the dirt of the alleyway. She looked up and saw the stars in the sky, thinking how beautiful they looked and what a disgusting thing she was doing._

"_Now think," Sabu ordered into her ear, "about your revenge."_

_Sandy had almost no time to think about his words before she felt his fangs dig into her neck. She could actually feel his venom darting like a scurrying bug through her circulation—this was happening so fast, something Sabu also realized but did not pay much attention to. She also wasn't moving or showing any signs of pain. Sabu assumed this meant she was going to die. He did not worry as she practically fell limp into his arms. In fact, he rather enjoyed it for it meant he got to feed on aristocratic blood in a matter of moments. Though instead of her body rejecting his venom, which is what happened when one died during the turning process, he felt her blood slowly start to mix with his fluid. This was slightly bizarre._

_Sandy felt numb. Perhaps it was the chilling weather or the frigid fingers of the vampire, but she could not feel anything except cold, and of course the strange sensation of venom in her bloodstream. Her hair was changing shape, her eyes getting bigger. Little did she know, her heart had already stopped beating and she had taken her last breath, her lungs shriveling inside of her. She kept her lime eyes opened to the stars as the very last bit of venom reached her heart._

"_I can't believe it," Flora whispered, putting a hand over her mouth. Sandy was no longer human—no, her blood had definitely attained the unappealing scent of vampire venom. However this vampirification was just not right. Sandy didn't scream nor cry; she didn't fidget or try to escape. She was lying there as if she had just awoken from a nap._

"_Incredible," Sabu said, pulling away from Sandy. He wiped his mouth clean of her blood, but couldn't take his eyes off of her as he did so._

_Sandy sat up, her skin noticeably paler and her eyes bigger, brighter. Her face had become slightly more hollow, but her newly-defined cheekbones suited her well._

_And her strawberry-blonde hair, which was wavy at best, had gained an almost metallic shine as well as formed into beautiful blonde ringlets._

_She blinked a few times, shocked at the sudden power she felt. "That is all…?" she asked. Her voice was ever-so deeper, more mature now._

"_Yes, but…" Sabu paused, unaware of how to proceed. This didn't make much sense. He stood up and offered her his hand._

"_I thought it would hurt a lot more. This wasn't exactly the deadly process you originally described it to be," Sandy added, taking Sabu's hand and standing. Sabu noted how strong her grip was._

"_You must have a power," Flora added, stepping up to Sandy. Perhaps she was a little envious that Sabu turned this newcomer himself, but she had an almost desperate timbre to her voice. It was still unheard of to turn so easily. She almost wanted to make sure Sandy had in fact, without a doubt changed._

_But Flora had spoken too soon._

_Sandy's entire body twitched as one of her strands of curled hair fell loose from her messy bun, and as it unraveled and reached her shoulder blades, it hissed. Another strand unraveled, leaving Sandy speechless as she realized her hair had a mind of its own. This kept happening and happening until all of her hair had fallen and formed a slithering mass of golden curls around her head._

"_Snakes…" One of the vampires said. "She has snakes coming out of her head!"_

_Sandy tensed as she felt her hair move around her. It…or should she say "they"…moved so quickly, spitting and slinking, and ultimately resting just beneath her chin._

"_Attack Flora," Sabu ordered. He stepped aside, giving Sandy a clear view of the other female vampire._

"_Sabu!" Flora cried, but Sabu glared at her and she stayed put. His word was final, after all._

"_I don't know how," Sandy reminded, looking at the other vampires around her for some sort of guidance. "I was not expecting this sort of power."_

"_Neither were we, child. This you must be certain of." Sabu moved behind her, trying to get a feel for her hair but the snakes sputtered their venom angrily at him and followed his every movement._

"_However this power is an incredible tool for exacting the revenge you so badly desire," he reminded. He placed his hands against Sandy's back, shocked when one of the curls actually lengthened and slid down Sandy's back, almost biting his hand, but Sabu moved it just in time._

"_Amazing!"_

"_How do I control them?" Sandy asked. It was bizarre, but she would just have to get used to the fact that her hair was made up of dozens of slithering snakes. Alright. She could do that._

"_You have to think," Sabu started, "of the very reason you wanted this power in the first place. It was revenge that drove you, and now you must send the energy of that revenge and fire at your target. If my hypothesis is correct, you need not worry about aim."_

"_Fire…at her?" Sandy asked again, turning to Sabu. Flora bit her lip but steeled herself for the attack. The snakes around Sandy's head all perked up, sensing what Sandy was being asked to do._

_Sabu nodded and motioned his hand as if to let Sandy know she could proceed._

_Sandy nodded to herself and thought. She thought of Maxwell's cold body. It was a thought that had brought tears to her eyes, but now all she could do was feel her eyes shake. She thought of her brother, awaiting his execution. She thought of her parents taken to their graves far too early. _

_And she thought of the king who thought he could have it all._

"_Go." It was an order, and before she realize what was happening, a single strand from either side of her head lunged forward, lengthening her hair to a remarkable degree, and went straight to Flora. Sandy just stood there and watched._

_Flora, being as experienced as she was, held out her hand defensively just in time. Sandy was still a baby, and her attack was not nearly as lethal as it could have been. The snakes barely nicked Flora's skin, and then they immediately retreated. _

"_It didn't do much," Sandy noted, disappointed. The snakes nestled back around Sandy's head. Flora growled in anger, but her skin had already started healing on its own._

"_It was enough to pierce an aged vampire's skin," Sabu described. "A human will not stand much of a chance against you." He tilted his head to the side and wondered. _

"_See if you can get them to stop."_

_Sandy nodded again, and out of habit took a deep breath. She concentrated and focused on the movement around her. The snakes didn't seem like they wanted to hurt her, for they had ample opportunity to bite into her undead flesh, but they made so such move._

"_Stop," she ordered. She tried to focus all her power away from her hair, and she felt a refreshing sensation travel down her appendages away from her head. _

_And just like that, her hair fell into limp, unmoving golden curls._

"_When do we move to the castle?" Flora asked, idly observing her wrist, now fully healed, as she looked at Sabu._

"_We take orders from her tonight," he replied, nodding to Sandy who looked up at the night sky._

"_Well according to vampire law, we cannot enter the castle without an invitation to come inside," one of the other vampires reminded. "How will we get in?"_

"_Don't worry." Sandy's voice was assuring. Keeping her eyes on the stars, she added, "I was once told I would always be welcomed in the castle." _

_._

_._

"_How was that?" Flora asked with a smirk as she and Sandy landed outside of the forest, falling into a crouched position on one of their knees._

_Sandy felt ridiculously energized. She had just been jumping through the forest, flying off branches as if they were stepping stones and passing acres of land every second. It was exhilarating. _

"_Incredible," she huffed out, fisting the damp grass beneath her, but as she stood up and saw the silhouette of the castle against the night sky, her eyes lowered yet again._

"_You still want to go through with this, then?" Sabu asked. He had landed a few moments earlier and was waiting in the clearing for the girls to catch up. Sandy looked at him and glared._

"_I did not go through with _this_," she barred her fangs, "for nothing." Her sire could only smirk at the rage that still dominated her aura. He had never seen such furious eyes in a vampire before. It just baffled him how mad such a tiny little creature was. _

"_So what—you immediately go in and kill The King and then we can eat his body? Hmm? Hmmmmmm?" one of the eager vampires asked. Sandy paused. She looked back at the castle, maybe fifty or so meters away at this point._

"_I will get all of you inside the walls—" The vampires around her, including Sabu, hissed with pleasure. "However!" she added, causing all eyes to fall back on her._

"_I have two requests," she added. She looked at Sabu, asking him if her rules would be followed. Sabu was a vampire of his word._

"_Anyone who disobeys any orders she gives will be severely reprimanded," he explained. The rest of the vampires nodded understandingly. That was all the warning needed to keep his gang in line._

"_I ask that you not kill or severely hurt any of the maids or guards unless they pose a lethal threat to you—please try to limit the damage inflicted to them, and I will consider draining them to a comatose degree the same as killing them."_

_There was an audible groan amongst the vampires before her, though Sabu kept his lips pursed and nodded._

"_I will go into His Majesty's chambers and deal with him. The rest of you can go into any part of the castle except," she paused again, keeping her eyes on the stone walls, "the library or the dungeon. The library is off-limits without fail, but only enter the dungeon when I arrive there."_

"_Is that all?" Sabu cracked his neck. It had been a while since his entire gang had went on a hunt. This turned out to be a night full of exceptionally unexpected, yet quite pleasant, surprises._

"_I shall call you." With those words, Sandy disappeared into the night, leaving a smirking gang of the living dead in her wake._

_The guards at the front gate of the castle were exhausted. They had spent most of the afternoon scouring the forest for any sign of the missing Lady Sandra, not given any breaks for food or water. If that wasn't troublesome enough, now they had to be wide awake, alert for any sort of wedding guests that were actually able to come on such ridiculously short notice._

"_I would bet my life it was a bear," one of the guards said to the other. _

"_Are there even bears in that forest? We've been on night patrol for years and I've yet to even hear of one!" the other replied. The two shivered at the thought of a bear coming out of the forest and attacking them. Bears were scary business._

_They had no way of predicting the upcoming terror that would enslave the castle for the next two centuries._

"_Do you think she made it into town?"_

"_It's a bit of a travel, but I suppose it is possible she ended up…"_

_Both guards paused as they saw a lone figure walking towards them. Given the limited visibility, all they could see was that it seemed to be a girl wearing a heavy gown._

"_You don't think…?"_

"_Stop, stop right there!" one of them screamed, pointing his lance at the figure that kept walking towards them. The figure did not hesitate in any way._

_Skirt ruffling against the stone path that lead up to the castle, her movements were slow but steady. She knew where she was going and kept walking as if she could move through the gate itself._

"_Stop, or we will not hesitate in attacking!" the guard repeated, keeping his weapon raised, however, by this point the figure was close enough so that her laughter could be easily heard by the humans._

"_There is no need for the cries, gentlemen. Surely you have been taught to never raise such objects at a Lady?" Sandy asked, appearing underneath the firelight of the gate's lanterns._

_For a second, the guards kept their lances pointed at her, unsure of how her dress looked so torn and ragged from the sides and bottom yet her face and hair looked stunningly beautiful. They had always thought of the young aristocrat as pretty, but, perhaps it was the poor lighting of the environment, she looked surreal._

"_My…my apologies, Lady Sandra! Raise the gates!" one of the guards cried._

"_You had the whole castle worried about you," the other guard explained, lowering his weapon and ushering the girl inside. "You must come in and get some rest before tomorrow's ceremony."_

_Sandy lowered her head and walked in as the gates slowly rose and meters away, the front doors of the castle slowly came undone due to the guards positioned there, only needing that one invitation to set her entire scheme into motion._

"_His Majesty will be so thrilled to have you back!" one of the guards followed her as she walked down the stone path, getting closer and closer to the front doors. "He was threatening to execute the entire outdoor staff if we could not find you in time for the ceremony…"_

"_That is so very much like him," Sandy mused. She kept a good ten paces in front of the guard, causing the man behind her to struggle to keep up._

_The guard did not realize that behind him, still at the gate, his fellow guard had been knocked in the head from behind. He now lay on the stone path, supine, as blood trickled out the mouth of his unconscious body. _

_Sandy kept her head down as she practically flew into the castle. "Come," she said so quietly that the guard following her couldn't tell she had said anything at all._

"_You're not hurt are you, My Lady?" the guard asked, finally catching up to her and entering the building. Their elongated shadows fell onto the red carpet that lined the foyer._

_The two guards at the front doors were soundlessly knocked out._

"_I am fine," Sandy explained, keeping her back to the man. "It is a shame, though, that the same can no longer be said about you."_

"_That's wonder…" The guard straightened up and took a step back, her words hitting him. Sandy slowly turned her head. Her sharp smile explained everything._

"_You'll only be out for a short while," she whispered into his ear, suddenly appearing behind his back. He felt a sudden pressure on his neck, and the next thing he knew, it was all turning black as he collapsed on his side._

"_Come in," Sandy whispered, stepping over the fallen man's body. Though she had only whispered the words, the gang of vampires instantly flashed into the entryway, filling the foyer with an icy air._

"_Using pressure points?" Sabu asked, lazily kicking the human at his feet. Sandy shrugged._

"_I once read about them in a book. I thought it was the least brutal way to keep the humans out of the way."_

"_Well then, shall we?" Flora asked, clapping her hands together. "We already took care of the humans in control of the gates—"_

"_But we want to taste The King!" one of the other vampires cried._

_Sandy looked at the throne before her. Her hands fisted._

"_Let's go."_

_._

_._

"_Your Majesty," an eerily high voice called out, awakening the ruler at once. He looked around his room, but his curtains had been drawn together and left nothing but a shroud of darkness._

"_Who…who are you? How dare you enter my chambers without proper permission?"_

"_Your Majesty," the voice repeated. The old man with his deteriorating vision could only make out that a figure was approaching his bed._

"_Guards! Guards!" the royal cried. Little did he know, everyone who could help him had been knocked out and was utterly unconscious, or worse. He was helpless._

"_Your Majesty," the voice said for the third time, feigning a hurt voice, "I come bringing good news: Mistress Sandy has returned!"_

_The King could see nothing but that the girl was standing right beside his four poster bed. He looked to the side of the bed; he kept a rifle beside his nightstand. If only there was some lighting in his room! He would have been able to reach for it by now._

"_I see," he said, keeping his eyes to the side. He had no idea that the girl before him could see everything he was doing with crystal clear perfection._

"_And where is she now?" he asked, turning his eyes to where the figure was standing. However, he could no longer see the shape of her body. Where had she gone?_

"_I am right here, Your Majesty!" Sandy cried. The curtains parted by themselves, shedding light on the newborn vampire standing at the foot of the royal's bed._

_She had the rifle in her hands._

_The King's jaw clenched. "How did you get in here without being noticed?" he demanded. Sandy shrugged._

"_Who would stop poor, defenseless Lady Sandra? She has no power. She can do no harm," she hummed, continuing to talk in the ridiculously high-pitched voice._

"_This has to do with your brother, does it not?" he asked, keeping his eyes on the rifle in her hands. "Alright, just hand me the gun and we can talk rationally."_

"_You want _this_?" Sandy asked, staring at the gun in her hands as if it were a strange new toy. "But it is such a flimsy tool…"_

_Without any effort, Sandy bent the gun as if it were a piece of clay. She tossed the weapon aside, letting its empty clanking be the only sound in the room for a few seconds._

_The King's eyes could not hide his fear. In a second, Sandy was sitting on top of his chest, her hand against his neck._

"_What _are_ you?" he asked, unable to take his eyes off of Sandy's brilliant lime orbs. "What did you do to yourself? You were not like this before!"_

"_Did you think," Sandy started to say, letting her fangs shimmer in the dull starlight, "that I would let you get away with murder, that I would sit and wait and actually marry you while my brother was sent to be executed?"_

"_You're a Monster!" The King realized, his voice choked as Sandy increased the grip around his neck. _

"_If you truly knew revenge," Sandy seethed, "then you would think what I did was trivial."_

_Despite her strength, her hatred and her obvious power, the royal did nothing but smile._

"_Hn," he snorted. Even his eyes now showed amusement. This was certainly not the reaction Sandy was expecting._

"_You laugh?" Sandy asked. She pushed his neck up. "I should push your head off of your decaying body for such insolence!"she screeched._

_Her rage was intensifying, Sabu, standing in the corner of the bedroom, noted. _

"_To find a way to eliminate me, you had to turn into a Monster," The King spurted out. Even though his voice was cracking, his lips curled into a satisfied snarl. _

"_Is there no human powerful enough to stop me? Am I truly that impossible to defeat?" he asked. A fearful thought hit Sandy: This man was using her becoming a vampire as a stroke to his own ego!_

"_Not when you sequester all the power for yourself," Sandy quickly reminded, pressing harder on his neck. "You do not _let_ others thrive. You keep everyone restricted and defeated."_

"_Killing me will not bring back your pathetic lover," he reminded. "How tragic. Even though you went to such desperate lengths to avenge him…"_

"_Killing you will bring me the satisfaction of knowing I brought down the vilest creature of all," Sandy spat._

"_While becoming one yourself?" he replied. Perhaps he was not expecting Sandy to actually kill him, but he was not taking her threats seriously._

"_Even with fangs and speed and strength, and such a deadly power," She cried, eyes shaking and hair starting to move all around her head, "I am not half the Monster that you are!"_

"_No," The King agreed, tilting his head back under her subzero grip, "you are at least twice as worse."_

_For a second, Sandy just stared at him, her mouth letting out a small cry of realization. She moved her hands away from his neck…_

…_and in the next second, she literally smacked the head right off the body._

_Blood seeped out of the severed neck. It pooled all around Sandy's skirt. It was tantalizing and Sandy wanted nothing more than to lick every drop of it, but she quickly flashed off the bed._

_She held her eyes, thinking she might cry, but her eyes remained dry. She shook her head as she put her back against the bedroom wall and slid down, crying, her voice scrunched up in pain and dejection._

_Sabu put his finger into the lifeless body and sucked the blood off of it. It tasted amazing, but his newest progeny was a little too crestfallen for him to thoroughly savor the experience._

"_Not many vampires can say their first kill was a royal," Sabu explained. He appeared beside Sandy, offering her some of the blood off his hand, but Sandy immediately turned her head._

"_Your restraint is impressive," he noted._

"_I promised his blood to you," she reminded, leaning her head against the wall. "This wasn't supposed to happen, Sabu!" she cried. "He was supposed to beg me to spare his life! To feel the same sort of terror I felt! This," she shook her hands, an indication of her turning into a vampire, "was for nothing! Nothing! I gave up my life for nothing!"_

_Sabu stared at her quietly. The snakes in her hair emerged and hissed wildly, telling Sandy to go and drink the fallen king's blood. "You attained a new life," he said quietly. "You have a new, amazing power."_

_Sandy shook her head, and instantly the snakes became lifeless curls again._

"_I also have a brother," she said quietly, standing up and walking to the window. "He said he would do anything for me."_

_She turned to Sabu, eyes gleaming as she smiled weakly, "I can only hope he means what he says."_

_._

_._

_With but two strikes, the dungeon guards fell forward onto their faces. Sandy thought she heard one of their jaw bones crack._

"_That was rather rough," Sandy said quietly, looking at Sabu, the one who knocked them out._

"_That was me being rather merciful, child," Sabu snorted._

"_I smell another aristocrat in there!" Flora beamed. She excitedly ran to the gates and gripped them with both her hands._

"_That is my twin," Sandy explained. Flora stepped aside as one of the other gang members started to raise the gate of the dungeon. The heightened sense of smell that Sandy now had made the putrid smell of the dungeon even worse._

_Stanley found it rather useless to try and get any sleep that night. He wanted to be awake and ready when they came to take him to his execution._

_He sighed and felt his head fall forward. Just a few more hours to live. Who would've thought that the son of one of the greatest dukes in the kingdom would suffer such a horrid fate?_

_Though, now that he thought about it, noble rank had nothing to do with what fate had planned. He looked up and sighed as he saw the silhouette of Maxwell's dead body lying on its stomach._

"_I smell another aristocrat in there!" _

_Stanley looked up. Was he hearing things, or was there actually a female's voice outside the dungeon? And what exactly did she say about smelling an aristocrat…?_

_He shook his head and looked back down. He was clearly hearing things due to his lack of food and all the beating he had to endure today. _

_His eyes were so tired. Perhaps he should get some sleep, as it was his last night, anyway. He didn't even realize it as the gates slowly opened. His lime eyes had just finished closing before he heard a "Tsk" come from somewhere in the dungeon. He had heard that very same "Tsk" hundreds of times before._

_He looked up, eyes widening as he saw Sandy leaning over Maxwell's body. She had it balanced on her knees. She gently moved his hair away from his face._

"_Sandy!"_

"_Tsk," Sandy repeated, keeping her eyes on Maxwell's form. "You would think they'd give a man who fulfilled his duties so loyally a decent burial."_

"_You escaped!" her brother cried. Though, there was something off about her. Her hair looked a little different, and though the lighting was exceptionally poor in the dungeon, her face and the rest of her body looked untouched while her dress was ragged. _

"_Hardly," Sandy said softly, gently placing the librarian's body onto the cold floor. She stood up and walked around it, slowly approaching her brother._

"_What are you—no matter, can you get me out of these chains?" he asked. "You'll need some sort of sword or lance."_

_Sandy kneeled beside her brother. Stanley felt a shiver immediately run through him. The female aristocrat curiously touched the chains that pinned her brother to the wall. Without batting an eyelash, she pulled one off of the wall._

_Stanley was left flabbergasted._

"_Sandy…How, how did you do that?"_

_Sandy once again amazed her brother by snapping off the manacle on his wrist that kept him bound to the chain._

_But what really amazed Stanley was how his sister simply vanished and then reappeared, a split-second later, on his other side, repeating the chain-breaking process._

"_Sandy!" Stan had no idea how to respond to such behavior. "How are you acting like this?"_

"_A thank you would be nice, brother," she mumbled, looking up at her brother with her pointed smile. "I did this partly for you, after all…" _

_Realization dawned on the Tigre heir._

_Stanley felt an ache in his chest so deep and pure that the grief he felt at his parents' passing only paled in comparison. He felt his breath stop in his throat. _

"_Sandy," he cried, voice low as he reached out to his sister, but immediately drawing his hand back. Truly, he would have rather gone through one-hundred thousand executions than had to see his sister in such a state._

"_I thought," Sandy said quietly, keeping her eyes on her brother, "that if I did this, I would find some peace, that I would feel powerful and not so useless anymore. I guess I truly must be delusional, hmm brother?"_

_Stan's heart was breaking just looking at his sister. The girl he had shared his life with was no longer a human. She was one of the Monsters people fled from. She could no longer live life normally. He could not let her._

_There was a small piece of wood next to him. It was only about the size of his palm, but it was sharp and knife-like on one end. He had been staring at it earlier when he was first chained up, praying that he could somehow get his hands on it and use it to pick the locks, however impossible that sounded._

_He never thought he would end up using the piece of wood to stake his sister._

"_I killed His Majesty," Sandy admitted, keeping her head down as Stanley secretly picked up the small piece of wood._

"_Did you really?" Stan asked. The moment he had seen her fangs he had figured she was a murderer. He slowly inched closer to her._

"_Yes, I hit his head right off his body, Stanley!" She looked up at him, eyes widening like a child describing their favorite toy. "He looked fearful of me, but it was only for a second. He said a few things to me…It was then that I thought that perhaps I had gone too far. I took the life of another, the same thing I wanted to make him pay for. You know he called me a monster?"_

"_He always was a bit of a hypocrite," Stanley said under the farce of a forced smile. _

"_You don't think the same, do you, Stanley?" she asked. As she looked up at him, Stanley saw the same innocence and fear of the girl who used to play with ribbons in the courtyard, the one who loved to dance and sing, the one he vowed to protect and give his life for._

"_I could never think of you as a monster," Stanley said quietly, returning his sister's stare._

"_But you have a stake in your hand, ready to attack me, brother," Sandy said quietly. Stanley immediately looked down, ashamed._

"_I…I couldn't live with the fact that for the rest of your life, you'd be condemned," he admitted, looking up at her as he put the piece of wood down. "Sandy," he said, hesitantly reaching his hand out to her ice-like face, "what have you done to yourself?" Stanley didn't cry often, but he felt a few tears race down his face as he thought of his precious little sister living such an unholy life._

"_Believe me, brother, when I say I ask the same thing of myself now." She smiled sadly as she put her hand against his, eyes shaking._

"_What do we do now, Sandy?" he asked. Sandy rested her face against his hand as she replied:_

"_You could kill me, brother," she offered._

_Stan's eyes widened. He was obviously not expecting anything of the sort to come out of her mouth. _

"_He will do no such thing!" Sabu appeared next to Sandy, holding her shoulders protectively and glaring at Stanley._

"_You're already an incredibly strong vampire," Flora said as she suddenly placed her face next to Stanley's neck, smelling his noble blood and running her other hand through his hair. "Why would you want to give that up so easily?"_

"_Please stay away from my brother, and do not touch that body!" She hissed, noticing one of the vampires next to Maxwell's body. Stanley shuddered at how dangerous her voice had sounded, not to mention the brunette vampire that was practically licking his neck._

"_You're no fun at all," Flora pouted, releasing Stanley. Stan immediately crawled away from her, quiet whimpers escaping him._

"_Sabu this was a mistake," Sandy reminded, sounding more and more like a child with him. "I turned for all the wrong reasons and I still could not accomplish what I set out to do!"_

"_You saved your brother, did you not?" Sabu asked, grabbing his progeny by her shoulders. Sandy nodded. "You murdered that bastard king, did you not?" Sandy nodded again._

"_Well then?" he asked._

"_But I gave up the most important thing of all to do it…What is the point of saving my brother if I can no longer live a normal life with him?" she cried, looking down. Sabu looked at Stanley; he looked like a coward. Why was Sandy so attached to such a weak brother?_

"_You spared him, what more could you ask for? You can come with us and he can continue doing whatever it is that he does."_

_Sandy shook her head. "I cannot leave my brother."_

"_Why not?" Flora questioned, having the same thoughts as Sabu. She appeared next to Stanley again, poking his biceps. His muscles were so strong…so much blood!_

_Sandy turned her head and looked at her brother, offering him a reassuring smile, even though Stanley was too frightened to really care._

"_He is my brother; we have been through too much together for me to abandon him," she explained, her smile widening despite the fact that Stanley was practically shaking at this point._

_Sabu released Sandy from his grip and suddenly flashed before Stanley, his hands on the young Duke's knees._

"_You're not abandoning him, my dear Sandy. You don't want to come with us big, bad monsters anyway, do you? What would a weak little thing like you do with us?" Sabu was patronizing Stanley, barring his ridiculously long fangs and coming right up to his face. Stan pressed his back further against the wall in fear, eliciting a laugh from the one-eyed vampire. "Heh. Pathetic."_

_Sandy's eyes lowered. "My brother is by no means weak!" All the vampires in the room, including Sabu, seemed to erupt with laughter at her comment. "He has a bigger heart and stronger soul than any of you!" Again, the laughter resonated through the dungeon walls and spread like sunlight on a summer day._

"_Sandy," Stan choked out, "Please." He needed to get out of here. He could no longer be in the company of such creatures._

"_I will stay with my brother," Sandy offered, causing Sabu to stop laughing at look at his newborn vampire confusedly. "You all can leave."_

"_I cannot let a child like you stay with a human. You still need to learn the ways of a vampire—and he will undoubtedly kill you, or perhaps vice versa."_

"_My brother would never hurt me and I would never hurt him!" she pleaded. _

_Sabu was actually hoping Sandy would forget about her brother for the time being. As long as he kept her away from the castle for a few days, until she lost her human and early vampire memories, he could re-enter the castle and feast on Stanley. The boy reeked of aristocratic blood! _

"_It is forbidden," Flora explained, tilting her head against Stan's tensed shoulder. "A vampire cannot live with a human unless the human is the vampire's mate—you two are siblings so mating is impossible between you two."_

"_Mates?" Sandy asked._

"_I shall explain that and many other things to you, but for the meantime, you must leave your brother," Sabu explained._

"_I still cannot leave him," Sandy breathed out. "For you will kill him once I leave." She looked at Sabu, one eyebrow raised._

_Her maker sighed and put on a bittersweet smile. "You discovered it…"_

"_What was there to discover? You and her," she nodded to Flora, "kept repeating how you wanted to devour any trace of royal and noble blood in the castle while we were travelling through the forest, and while I was just talking to my brother I heard all of you talking about feasting on him once I left his side."_

"_We are Vampire," Sabu reminded, "it is what we do."_

"_Something else you did was promise me that I could give out the orders tonight. My brother is never to be harmed by any of the vampires in this dungeon or by any associated vampires," Sandy added, protectively flashing between her brother and Sabu._

"_And the only way I could ensure his safety is to stay by his side," she finished. Sabu looked at Flora, and the brunette vampire nodded._

"_Well…I'm just throwing this idea out there, but you could turn him, Sandy," Flora suggested, pretending as if the idea just hit her. "If he became a vampire, you would get to stay by his side forever and no one could ever hurt him!"_

"_No!" Stanley cried out, but the wheels were already turning in Sandy's brain._

"_You said that that the vampirification process is almost always fatal," Sandy reminded. "He will probably die! You want him to die!" Sandy cried, turning to Sabu._

"_We will feast on him the second we get the opportunity, yes." Sabu had no qualms about admitting his intentions. _

"_I would rather die by their hands!" Stan interjected, rising forward but being pushed back by Flora's hand. "Sandy, do not do it!"_

"_Do it, Sandy," Sabu countered, placing his freezing digits on her shoulder. "I am your maker. _You_ listen to _me_."_

_Sandy turned to her sire and her eyes widened, her mouth falling open. He nodded, and she fisted her hands. She felt her eyes shaking as she turned to her brother. Flora quickly moved away, knowing she'd get an extravagant meal soon enough._

"_I cannot let the others have the satisfaction of killing you as their prey," she said softly, touching her brother's frightened face. "And though I may kill you in the process, I have to know I tried to do everything to preserve your life."_

"_Please, Sandy," Stanley begged. "I cannot become a Monster!"_

"_You won't ever become one of those," Sandy said, grabbing her brother by the shoulders and pressing him against the wall with her unnatural strength. _

_With eyes shaking, she added, "You'll become just like me, brother…!"_

_Stanley was crying. He could not control the tears that kept falling out of his eyes. If she could still cry she would be sobbing as well._

"_Stanley, we could spend eternity together. I cannot do it without you," she whispered into his ear, her voice cracking. "You have always been there to protect me and make sure no one ever hurts me. How can I continue without you there for me?"_

"_I cannot do this, Sandy," her brother repeated, more tears falling down his face. Sandy pulled away from his neck, looking into the eyes that mirrored her own._

"_Please, brother. I am fully aware of how selfish I am being, but being immortal means nothing for me if I have to see you perish. Won't you come with me into forever?" she begged. _

_Stanley figured he was about to die, and that his sister would be the one to kill him. But he had to forgive his sister, he realized. He promised his parents that he would always protect her and if need be, give his life for her. And he would do so without hesitation, for she was his precious little sister and he could never see her in pain._

_He did not want to do this, though he had little choice in the matter. He shut his eyes as he thought of his sister's face. She had gone through so much today, losing the one she loved and then turning into such a detestable creature. She was in so much pain._

_And somewhere deep in his subconscious—though he didn't even realize it—he decided that she had seen too much hurt in one day, enough to last most people a lifetime. He had decided that she should not see any more pain. He would not leave her alone in such pain._

"_Focus on your fangs, Sandy," Sabu ordered, bored as he leaned back on his palms, impatiently waiting to drain Stanley. "Your fangs should be elongated—those are the fangs used to turn."_

_Sandy nodded and did as she was told. Indeed, she could feel her pincers growing longer and longer until they were at least an inch long. _

_She looked at her brother with her saddened eyes and smiled, as if trying to soothe him. Stanley could do nothing but cry, cursing his fate and that of his sister. _

_He hated seeing her in this much pain. It was unbearable._

"_Now locate his carotid artery—yes, just like that. Do you feel its pulse? Bite directly into that pulse," Sabu directed._

"_Thank you so much, Stanley," Sandy whispered. Stanley cursed. Both twins shut their eyes as Sandy bit into him._

_Stanley was too numb and tired to truly feel any pain. He had been given so little time to actually think about the process that he had no idea what to expect. He did feel, however, a thick feeling spreading all throughout his body. It felt wrong and unnatural and his body was fighting it. But it was losing._

_The venom, or what Stan was thinking of as the "sticky" feeling, reached his heart and Stanley shuddered, not realizing he was taking his very last breath. He felt the tears stop falling from his eyes. His hands were getting cold. He thought he was dying._

"_I cannot smell his blood anymore, Sabu," Flora whispered to the gray-haired vampire, a worried expression cast over her beautiful features. "I can only sense venom!"_

_Sabu sat-up and watched with the same worried feeling as Stanley, without so much as a flinch of discomfort, was slowly turning. His face was changing very slightly, just to make the angles more attractive and masculine. His skin was losing its color second-by-second. He merely had his back against the wall, and though he was forcing his eyes shut, he was practically just sitting there as Sandy dug her fangs into him!_

_Stan bit his lip, feeling like an iceberg had just appeared in place of his brain. He was getting colder and colder. This was such a disgusting feeling—surely he must've died by now!_

_Sandy could feel Stanley's skin hardening, but she could not get her hopes up. She focused on infecting her brother with her venom, and through some unexplainable force, she could sense it running through him, monitoring her progress. She was almost there, she could feel it._

_Stan released his lip as he felt a sharp pain. He opened his bright eyes slowly, realizing as he stared straight ahead that he could suddenly see all the details in the dungeon's far wall, he could see every single strand of Maxwell's blood-matted hair, he could hear the gritting of Sabu's teeth. _

_He could also sense, somewhere in the castle, that someone was waking up. They were confused and scared…_

_He ran his tongue over his teeth and realized what was happening._

"_This must be some sort of a joke!" Sabu cursed, placing his hand over his face in frustration. _

_Finally, Sandy could taste her brother's venom instead of his blood. Not waiting another second, Sandy tore away from her brother, amazed to see his astonishingly green eyes stare at her in confusion._

"_Stanley!" she cried, shaking him. "Stanley you did it! You were able to turn!"_

_Anger. Excitement. Hatred. Confusion. Fear. _

"_So many…so many emotions!" he cried as he tore away from his sister, unwittingly flashing away just a few meters from her. He was now standing, but he was grabbing his head. So many emotions at one time! He couldn't conventrate. This was too much!_

"_What…?" Sandy asked in confusion, turning to Sabu, Flora and the rest of the vampires._

"_His power is detecting others' emotions," Sabu explained as he and Flora stood up. "Weak."_

_Stanley fell on his knees, still grabbing his head. More and more of the guards and maids were waking up. They were all frightened and anxious. They were all overwhelming him._

"_I met one of those once," Flora explained. "With enough training, they can even start detecting thoughts—but right now he needs to learn some control."_

_Flora appeared in front of Stanley, who didn't seem to notice. Kneeling ever-so slightly, she placed her index finger on his forehead and a light came out of her finger. Stanley immediately let go of his head and fell on his bottom._

"_Sto—" Sandy started, but Sabu put his hand on her shoulders and stopped her._

"_Flora's power is negating other vampires' powers," he explained._

"_You're welcome," Flora snapped as she walked away. Sandy took this opportunity to run to her brother, grabbing his shoulders. _

"_Brother, you're alive," she cried, her happiness hitting Stanley, but not in an overbearing way. However, Stanley could not say the feeling was mutual. _

"_This…this isn't called being 'alive', Sandra," he hissed, slapping his sister's hands away. He stood up and walked away from her, his hand over his eyes._

"_Brother…!" Sandy cried, staring at his back as she stayed on the cold dungeon floor._

"_I can kill him," Sabu suggested, but he figured his progeny would not take too kindly to that._

"_How bizarre," Flora said to one of the other vampires. "They both turned so easily, without any pain."_

"_What do you think it means?" the blonde-haired gang member asked her. But the gorgeous brunette could only shrug._

"_Who knows, but the fact that their bodies accepted the change so easily…it was like they were made to be changed."_

"_This was not supposed to happen!" Stan cried. He turned around and faced his sister, who quickly stood up. His fangs were exposed as he approached her. "I was supposed to die! I cannot exist as a demon!"_

"_I did what I thought was best! You obviously had some will to survive or you would have died instead of turning!"_

"_No," Stan said immediately. His hands were shaking with anger. "I told you I would much rather prefer to die than to ever become like _them_." He indicated Sabu and the rest of the vampires._

"_You have a poor excuse for a power and can barely control even that; do not compare yourself to us," Sabu ordered. "I am Sandy's sire and she is yours. You will show your superiors some respect!"_

"_You told me you regretted becoming one of them," Stanley reminded, ignoring Sabu. "Why would you think I would fare any better?"_

"_But Stanley, they would've killed you and drained you of your blood!"_

"_There are things," Stanley said, flashing in front of Sandy and placing his hands on her shoulders, lowering himself to be eye-to-eye with her, "that are far, far worse than death, Sandy."_

_Sandy released herself from her brother and looked to the side. Maxwell's body was still there. There was still a pool of blood under him, but it was too old to be desirable to the other vampires. She collapsed beside him, her eyes staring at his form. She could feel the blood seeping through her skirt and chill her already-frigid skin._

"_I cannot agree with that notion, brother," she said quietly as she touched the blood-soaked strands of Maxwell's chestnut hair._

_Stan flashed beside Sandy, placing his hand on her shoulders. She was right. He had to have had some desire to live on, even though he truly wished for death rather than living as such a beast. He had always been her protector. He figured he would be until the day he died, and it seemed as though that warranty had simply been extended._

"_I want to bury him," Sandy said quietly. "Today, if possible…"_

"_Then we shall; he deserves one," Stanley said quietly. _

"_You should bury him in an unmarked grave," Sabu explained. "You should abandon all remnants of your human life so you have no reminders of it once you forget."_

"_Forget?" Sandy asked, turning to her maker. "I cannot forget him!" she said, turning back to Maxwell's form and gently touching his face._

"_Oh, but you _will_ forget," he continued. "You will forget your entire human life, how to feel emotions, and with that you will also lose your first few days of being a vampire. It is for the best, given what state you came to me in, and your brother's current hatred for what he has become. All of that will be forgotten."_

_Sandy's mouth fell open as she brushed her fingers against Maxwell's equally-cold skin. It was hard to imagine that she would honestly forget all that she felt for him._

"_Impossible," she said quietly. _

"_It seems that way now," Flora said quietly, walking around and inspecting the dungeon. "But within a few days, your new life will truly begin. You will get a clean slate."_

"_Perhaps it is for the best," Stanley added, removing his hand from his sister's shoulder. He looked to the side. "You've seen so much pain today, Sandy—forgetting would keep you at peace."_

"_But all of you would remember, wouldn't you?" Sandy asked, once again turning to Sabu. He nodded._

"_Then please do not tell us in the future, even if we ask," Stan said, standing up and walking to him. "I don't wish to see Sandy relive this pain, and I don't care for these memories myself…"_

"_Hn," Sabu coolly brushed passed the youngest vampire in the room and went to Sandy. "Is that what you would prefer, Sandy?"_

_Sandy could not keep her eyes off of Maxwell's body. She sighed, shutting her shaking eyes. "I suppose what my brother says is for the best."_

_Sabu rolled his eyes. "Very well." He was a vampire of his word, after all._

"_Our parents…!" Sandy said immediately, looking up at Stanley. His eyes also showed a bit of panic at the thought of forgetting them._

"_Trivial concepts," Sabu dismissed. "Unlike this castle you have just inherited." He looked around, letting out a low whistle. "It is secluded enough to live peacefully, away from the humans for quite some time—in fact, you could probably bend the humans who work here to your will."_

"_I used to think this castle was so beautiful," Sandy said quietly, out of habit rubbing her eyes, feeling phantom tears. She continued to display a broken smile as she stroked the late researcher's hair. "But every time I am inside of it, I feel like my life has become a never-ending nightmare."_

"_It's a dream we cannot wake-up from," Stanley added, noting through the tiny cracks of the dungeon wall that it would be daylight soon._

_._

_._

"Wake up, Stanley," Bijou said, pulling back all the black curtains that shaded their room.

Stan groaned. "It's far too bright, _Cherie_. Close them," he ordered as he tried to turn over to his right side, away from the sun, however, he found that his left arm and left leg would not move. Neither would his right arm or right leg, now that he thought about it.

"Oh, Stanley! You've been in far brighter light for quite some time now. A little more sunlight won't kill you, or maybe it will…Frankly, I don't care!" Bijou chimed, her voice passionate and bubbly as she moved away from the windows.

Stanley opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was his mate at the foot of his bed. She was wearing a white sundress. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, with her bangs hanging out and curled around her stunning face.

His first instinct was to ask her why she was wearing such attire, but as he realized that all his appendages were chained to one part of the wall, outstretching his body into an X-like position, he realized he had bigger problems at hand.

"I wanted to look nice," Bijou explained, playing with one of her curled strands. "It's a special occasion, after all."

"_Cherie_," he growled, trying to pry the chains off the wall, "what is the meaning of this?" The chains would not budge.

"That's the strongest alloy of titanium available in the world. Even the strongest vampires can't break those chains—believe me, I tested them myself," she smirked, placing both her palms against the footboard and leaning forward.

"And in your weakened state, Stanley, it would only be a waste of time," she added as an afterthought.

It was only after Bijou said this that Stan realized how hungry he was, and that as he stared around his bedroom, he saw large, five-foot tall halogen lamps with bulbs the size of his head surrounding the perimeter of his bed. Thankfully, they were turned off.

But they had been turned on at one point, he realized, noting the dark circles around his arms and legs. His skin seemed to look bruised from all over. He could also practically sense the dark circles underneath his eyes. He had been in the lamplight for quite some time, and the fact that Bijou had the curtains open on an unusually sunny day only made matters worse. His skin was starting to itch, and soon it would start to burn.

"I turned these babies off just a couple of minutes ago," Bijou said, flashing beside one of the lamps and resting her elbow on it. "You had been in them for a couple of hours, but I decided I needed you alive a few minutes longer so that I could explain." She said, waving behind her to the curtains and the slower burn of the sunlight.

"Explain what—and how long has it been since I fed?" he asked, voice dangerously low, as he tried to futilely sit up.

"Let's see," Bijou said as she put a finger on her lips. She moved around his bed slowly as she thought. "On one of my first days in the castle, you told me that you needed to be in the sunlight for a few hours to fully burn, and so I left you in the lamplight for a couple of hours. I was in a generous mood, and again, you have to hear what I have to say," she explained, giving him a sharp look for a second. She moved to the other side of the canopy bed and leaned against the pole.

"You also told me that you would only feel a lack of blood if you hadn't fed in over a year." Her glare at him intensified. "It's been just about one-and-a-half years since your last feeding," she spat. "And frankly, Stanley, you don't look too good."

He could not see it, but his cheeks were hollow and his eyes were sunken in. Even his hair looked duller. And of course, the burn marks all over his skin didn't add to his appearance.

"I fed just a few days ago! You gave me a chalice of blood when we were sitting outside the castle at night!" he reminded. Bijou smiled and shook her head, turning around and letting out a short, sweet laugh.

"No, no, Monster," she explained, "that was something I _made_ you believed had happened. It was all in your head, Stanley. Much like me finding that…let's see, what was it…ahh, that wedding magazine! That never actually happened. Oh, but maybe I should backtrack a little?" She offered, seeing his confused expression. "I was able to do all of that because of my power."

"You don't have that sort of power," Stanley cried. "Your power is—"

"I know, you and Sabu, you both thought I had no power," Bijou finished, but Stanley shook his head.

"No! I knew what your power was! It's—"

"Absolute hypnosis," she finished, staring at Stanley as she sat down on the surface of his desk, crossing her legs and leaning back on her palms.

Stan stopped, staring at his mate as she continued glowering at him.

"What…?" he was left speechless.

Bijou picked up a book from the surface of the desk. It was dark green with a red ribbon inside it. "I learned from this book, while I was still a human, that if I really wanted—that if I was willing to sacrifice everything—I could wish for a specific power, but I had to _really want it_. And so I wished for the power to control one's every sense—touch, sight, sound, taste and smell, to make one see whatever it was I wished them to see and do whatever it is I wished them to do. All I had to do was hypnotize you to fall into a deep sleep, and then just by touching your hand, I could make you see anything I wanted you to see."

"You had this plan since you were a human?" he cried, once again trying to break free but it was no use. He had less than a tenth of the strength he normally had, and even his full power would not be enough to break the metal.

Bijou sat up straight, her emerald eyes still narrowed as she leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees and folding her hands under her chin.

"I thought of this plan just a few short days after my husband died—a man you killed exactly two years ago to this day," she explained, revealing that she had, in fact, not lost her human memories. "I also prayed that I would not lose my memories once you turned me."

"_Cherie_, _I _am your mate. Your feelings for your husband cannot compare to what you feel for me—"

But he was interrupted as Bijou's laughter rang out like Church bells on a Sunday morning.

"My God, you disgusting monster!" she laughed, appearing right beside him on the bed and patronizingly ruffling his hair. "You cannot honestly still believe I ever loved you!"

Stanley's lowered eyes showed otherwise, so Bijou sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose as she thought.

"Alrighty, how to explain this…Well," she said, looking at him and grabbing one of her knees as it folded over the other leg. "I was reading a book on how to mask emotions and even start showing fake ones. You saw me reading it once, but you dismissed it because you said humans had no idea what they were talking about regarding their own feelings."

Stan hissed, vaguely remembering that conversation between the two of them.

"I knew after you murdered my husband that I could not let you simply live on. I had to find a way to take your world from you the same way you did mine," Bijou continued. "But to truly catch you off-guard, I had to become a vampire in order to get the hypnosis power I needed. You, of course, would not try and turn me unless you thought I would actually, you know, _turn_. So I had to make you think I wanted to become a vampire, and to do that, I had to pretend to be in love with you and act like I wanted to be with you for all of eternity." She grabbed her heart and sighed, feigning the look of a girl deeply in love.

"It's a rather circumstantial scheme, _Cherie_," Stan noted. "What would've happened had you not attained the power you wanted?"

"Shut up," she snapped, and immediately, Stan felt his lips come together. "Perhaps I should've explained a little better. My power isn't Absolute Hypnosis as much as it is Absolute Hypnotic _Control_. I _make_ you conform to what I want since I can control all your senses. You're still under my control, and will continue to be under it until I release you, or I die." She smiled as she leaned close to his face.

"I have waited for this day for _so long_."

She flashed to the other side of the room and paced around, her hand over her mouth as she thought. "But if I hadn't gained this power, I would've eventually found a way to kill you. My desire to see you dead only seemed to get stronger once I became a vampire.

"I really hated the fact that I had to become a vampire to do so, but it was something I felt I had to do. Humans cannot face Monsters. It just is not a level playing field. I'm sure somewhere in your pitiful, black heart, you agree. So, anyway, the flu was unexpected, but it provided the perfect situation: Either I died, or I became a vampire. I would be satisfied with both outcomes, but I wanted to turn, if only to set my plan into motion. And what do you know! I actually became a vampire! Yes…everything was going rather well until…well, Sabu proved to be a momentary inconvenience."

Bijou stopped pacing and tapped her fingers against her pink lips. "I told him to never return to the castle. He didn't realize I was hypnotizing him into leaving and never, ever coming back; he can't ever return now. His body will not let him. I could probably put him into a deep sleep, too, now that I think about it, but that would be too much trouble. He was already suspicious about me and I needed him out of the way."

Bijou sighed and continued, taking a deep breath out of habit. "But anyway, after he left, I told both you and Sandy to go to sleep. Do you remember that?"

Stanley jerked forward, just realizing that Sandy would also be under her control. The white-haired beauty saw that and shook her head.

"Sandy's fine. I would never do anything to hurt her. She's in a deep sleep, but I've made sure she's been fed properly and been kept out of sunlight. Besides, she seems too busy wrapped up in her own memories—she's pretty much torturing herself," she explained.

"So yes," Bijou continued, "I told you and Sandy to go to sleep just about eighteen months ago, so about one-and-a-half years. With how long you've gone without blood and how long you've been in the lamplight, I imagine you only have a few hours left…or maybe just one. Either way, it's too long," she said.

"Ohh!" Bijou cried, noticing a small twig on surface of Stan's desk. "Do you remember that little yellow bird that came to visit me? It was the first time I was able to test my powers. The first time I saw it I told it to come to me the next day with a twigful of berries. And remember how it visited me the next day with the berries?" she asked. "It was a pretty good day to see that all I had wished for was slowly coming to fruition."

Victory was all over the room, Stan noted angrily. He had never felt such accomplishment coming from one person before.

"And now here we are," she said, flashing beside him and suddenly holding a wooden stake in her hands, causing Stanley to tense in fear. "Any last words, Stanley?" she asked.

Suddenly, his lips parted and he could speak again. "_Cherie _-" he started, but Bijou started to raise the stake, so he quickly offered, "_You_! You have incredible power, you don't even realize it! You could become the strongest vampire in all of history! We could have vampires like Sabu and Francoise, even that floozy Flora, bow down to us!" He had to tell her, get her to see that she had another power she didn't even know of. Where were those hideous black dragons when you needed them?

"Stop," Bijou ordered, and immediately Stanley's lips shut tight once again. She shook her head and lowered the stake momentarily. "I don't even know who Flora is, first of all." She continued shaking her head.

"You would think that after all I've seen you do, I would spare you and live a life of power?" When Stan looked at her expectantly, she sighed. "You might be only one, and there may be hundreds of creatures like you out there who think humans are their playthings, but I would be satisfied knowing I rid the world of just one Monster.

"But of course, that would make me a murderer, too, wouldn't it? And I know my own strength…I theoretically could make anyone see anything I wished, just by putting them into a deep sleep and touching them for a second. Forever is too long. One day I might wake up and become crazed with power lust. It's just too tempting."

She raised her stake, "So after I kill you, I have to kill myself."

Stan's eyes widened, desperately trying to move forward. She may have hated him, but she was still his mate. He could not sit by and let her commit suicide.

"You have no choice," Bijou told him as if reading his thoughts. A wave of depression overcame her. "My vision is no longer clouded, and what I see is a world too ugly to live in."

With that said, Bijou stabbed the stake she was holding straight into Stanley's heart. The vampire, still under Bijou's hypnosis, could not even open his mouth to scream as his chest thrust forward, his body almost looking like an oblong parachute, and a sticky, maroon liquid erupted out of his heart and all around the stake. Some even landed on Bijou. His eyes were widened, but his pupils were tiny little dots against his sclera.

He remained elevated for only a few seconds before he collapsed back onto the bed, his body shriveled and prune-like. Bijou could hear birds chirping outside, and if she really, really focused hard enough, she could even hear cars a couple of miles away. Life went on even though hers wouldn't and Stanley's didn't.

_If you can even call this a life_, she thought dryly. She turned around, picking up another stake that she had placed on the nightstand. She felt no remorse at Stanley's death, something that unnerved her all the more. Bijou stepped into the sunlight of the opened curtains, smiling as she saw an orange bird fly by over her head.

She had seen all those news reports, those web articles…her husband and parents had even come on air and had pleaded for her safe return. She figured she could not meet them in the afterlife—she was not worthy of where they were headed. So Bijou stared at what she honestly believed was the last pretty thing—the sun—that she'd see, before she raised the wooden stake up and stabbed it straight into her chest, apologizing to all the ones she loved.

A white dragon, something that was floating around the castle, faded away.

.

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Sandy sat straight up, feeling almost robotic with how suddenly she had moved. She stared around, having trouble believing that this was the same room she had once been held captive in. _Or maybe she had never stopped being held captive._ The curtains were drawn shut, her room looked unchanged, but something was off.

That's when she realized a stack of papers on her desk.

She moved to her desk curiously, picking them up, eyes widening at what she saw.

It was a genealogy report. It had to be at least fifty pages long, but the very first name on the list was Matthew Librius.

_Maxwell's father_, Sandy realized, seeing her former love's name written right beneath Matthew's name. Maxwell had told her that his mother had died, but he had not mentioned his father. It seemed as though his father had other children after the passing of Maxwell's mother, for the genealogy report went for pages upon pages, Sandy realized, flipping through all of them and staring at all the names.

The Librius progeny seemed to distribute into wealthy French families. It was hard to believe that all these names were essentially the great, great, great, great, great, great, great- (and so-on) nieces and nephews of Maxwell. She wondered if any of these people looked like him. Some still carried the surname Librius, despite the time-gap. Sandy felt a surge of emotion and smiled.

Until she got to the very last page of the report.

The very last page held the culmination of the most direct lineage of the Librius clan. Their surname was different, but not unfamiliar to Sandy in anyway.

Bijou Ribon was the last name listed. She was the latest, youngest descendent that Maxwell had. Bijou had somehow discovered this fact (and somehow discovered that Sandy once knew Maxwell) and decided to show Sandy.

But why wouldn't she just tell Sandy herself?

Clearly, something did not feel right.

She did not see the note at the very bottom of the stacks of paper. It was a single printed page that read, _I'm sorry_.

Sandy dropped the papers she was holding, immediately flashing to her bedroom door. Her bedroom door seemed stronger…was there another lock on it from the outside? No matter, with a little effort, Sandy was able to break the door. She immediately went to Stanley's room.

She realized there were no guards or maids around, but she dismissed that thought (not possibly knowing that Bijou had fired each and every one of them over a year ago) as she pushed open Stanley's bedroom door, a cry escaping her as soon as she saw what, or whom, lay inside.

"STANLEY!"

Stanley's corpse, complete with the stake still through his heart, rotted in the sunlight. He was connected via chains on all his limbs, but his dead body was thinning and soon would burn into nothing.

Sandy's eyes shook. For the first time in over two-hundred years, a tear fell down her cheek as she approached his bed, shivering at the sight of his haggard body. She crawled onto his bed, desperately shaking him, but it was no use. His glass-like eyes stared upwards. They would no longer look at her lovingly and protectively. It was too late. She was too late. Her hands trembled and heart ached as if it had been the one to be staked. Sandy felt her world breaking all over again. This was too much, how could she go through the pain of loss again? Why couldn't Stan have taken her with him? She started hyperventilating, even though she had no reason to breathe.

"_Stanley,"_ she cried as she threw himself onto his torso, her face getting stained with his sticky blood.

It seemed every man she loved died in painful ways. She put her blood-stained hands into her face and sat on his bed, sobbing for nearly a half-hour as she shuddered with sorrow.

It was only as she lifted her face to dry her eyes that she realized the other body on the ground. It, too, was a vampire that lay in the open sunlight, but this corpse neither rotted nor burned. It had a stake going through its heart, but the blood that came out of its body was not globby and sticky: it was liquidy and stained her clothes, just like human blood.

Sandy choked back some tears as she got off the bed and approached Bijou's dead body. Her face almost seemed to be glowing in the sunlight. Her eyes were closed, and her mouth formed a small smile. She was at peace. She looked nothing like the vampire she actually was.

This girl had taken the life of her brother. She had clearly deceived them both. Sandy could never forgive her for that, and she never would.

But this girl had also suffered a pain similar to Sandy's. She had seen the love of her life die before her very eyes. Sandy could only feel empathy for this girl she considered to be a sister.

And truth be told, a little bit of love. She was Maxwell's relative.

"You never forgot anything, did you, Bijou?" Sandy said quietly as her voice cracked. She touched some of the curls in Bijou's hair and smiled bittersweetly. Tears fell onto the dead female's face.

"Neither could I."

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Bijou opened her eyes, feeling slightly overwhelmed by the sudden brightness. She felt so dizzy, she nearly fell over. If it wasn't for the support of the side of the stone bridge she was on, she surely would have fainted. As she leaned her head forward, over the bridge, she saw the most beautiful, crystal-like blue water she had ever seen in her life. She could see her reflection in it perfectly. It was almost like staring into a mirror.

"Where am I?" she asked quietly. She slowly straightened up, looking to her right. At the end of the stone bridge there was the brightest grass ever, complete with an array of bushes and trees and perfect flowers—ones so stunning that Bijou was sure she had never seen anything like them before. And there were some of them in every color! Red, pink, white, orange, blue, yellow, no hue was missing! And there were birds and butterflies and golden sunlight! It was the most breath-taking scene she had ever had the pleasure to witness!

"Welcome," an excited voice said from her left. Bijou immediately turned around, coming face-to-face with a Ham-Human with chestnut brown hair and bright, friendly blue eyes. He was dressed in an all-white suit, and now that Bijou looked down, the white sundress she remembered wearing had turned into a longer, more flowy, sweetheart-topped white dress that fell just below her knees. She also realized her body's shape was that of her human body, not her vampire one.

"Who…who are you? Where am I?" Bijou said, taking a step back. The man smiled and offered her his hand. Bijou reflexively took another step back. The man could only smile.

"You'll find out everything soon enough, Bijou," he said, "But you don't want to go that way. It's the way you came from, you see. We need to cross the bridge and come onto _this_ side. A lot of people want to see you," he explained. As he stepped aside, he showed Bijou the other end of the bridge, which opened onto a lawn that was even brighter than the one on the other side. She didn't think that was possible. And as she squinted, she could just make out what looked like her late grandmothers and grandfathers, amongst a few other familiar faces, in the crowd. They were all wearing white and seemed to be waving at her.

"No, no," Bijou shook her head and stepped back, the reality of the scene finally hitting her. "This can't be right! I can't be here—there must be some mistake!" she told the brown-haired man in front of her. "I'm a sinner—a, a murderer! A monster! A deceiver! I did horrible things!"

The man nodded his head, "But the one who invited you here is most forgiving."

Bijou kept shaking her head and moving backwards. "I don't belong here. This must be a dream," she said as tears filled her eyes. "I deserve to be punished."

The blue-eyed stepped closer to her, about to say something when another voice called out.

"Can I talk to her?"

The brown-haired man looked over his shoulder and smiled, "Of course." He stepped aside and revealed…

Bijou felt the breath stop in her throat. The newcomer stepped onto the bridge, walking past the brown-haired man, keeping his eyes only on the emerald-eyed beauty.

"It's been a while, Bijou," he said, smiling. Bijou let out a small cry as she, without warning, ran into his white-clad body, not caring if this was a dream. She sobbed into her husband's shoulder and he held her in his embrace, just thankful to have her back after such a trying separation.

"Is it really you?" she asked, pulling apart from him and touching his face, his hair, smelling him. _He still smells the same…_

"I think so," he replied, cupping her face in his hands.

"But this doesn't make any sense!" she cried as he started to wipe the tears away from her eyes, something he used to do all the time. "I became a monster and I took my own life and I ended someone's life and I lied to so many and…"

She stopped when her husband placed his finger over her lips, something that would always calm her whenever she became too frantic. She immediately quieted down and watched as he took both of her hands in his own and started leading her off the bridge.

"There's a guy here that I think you wanna meet. He knows what you did, and He might not be thrilled about all the choices you made, but He's thankful you kept your belief in Him all this time," he explained. "That faith through all the hardships is what brought you here."

As he led her off the stone bridge and her bare feet fell into the plush, impossibly green grass, the crowd in the distance cheered and started running to her. Bijou suddenly felt a comfortable warmth wrap all around her. She looked up at the sky; it was such a perfect color. Not a cloud in sight.

"Are all those people here to see me?" Bijou asked, looking down and seeing the people running to her. Her husband smiled and nodded, staring at the imminent rush of newcomers.

"We were waiting for a while to see you," the brown-haired man said, coming off the bridge and standing beside her.

"You couldn't have come soon enough," Bijou's husband added. He kept his arm around her waist and kissed her white locks. Bijou felt tears in her eyes. She couldn't remember the last time she cried in happiness.

The crowd was now forming around Bijou, crying and hugging and kissing and just _loving_ her and filling her with a warm feeling that would never, ever disappear from this point forward. She had forever to bask in the light of that tenderness.

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"_My sword, Kyouka Suigetsu: Mirror, Flower, Water, Moon…it possesses the power of 'Complete Hypnosis'...'Complete Hypnosis' controls the 5 senses to the point that it can make the target misinterpret another person's form, shape, mass, feel and smell to be that of the 'enemy'. In other words, it can make a dragon out of a fly and a field of flowers out of a swamp in the eyes of the hypnotized."_

_-"Bleach" ch. 171: End of Hypnosis_

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Happy 2011, everyone! Thank you so much for all the support I've received for this fic! I appreciate sticking with me while I tried a new genre and experimented a bit. It means the world to me that you would read all of this. Hopefully I'll be able to update a lot more frequently from now on, but thank you for making this such an enjoyable year. You guys are the best.

-CN


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